


Off the Beaten Path

by Natala



Category: Merlin (BBC)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-13
Updated: 2010-01-13
Packaged: 2017-10-06 05:49:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 24,758
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/50332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Natala/pseuds/Natala
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Merlin had been gone three hundred and seventy-two days when Morgana disappeared. This how they came home.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Off the Beaten Path

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers: Season 1

Sunlight shone in through the window, turning the bed golden, their skin glowing as Arthur rolled them with a laugh, pinning Merlin beneath him with a gentle hold on his wrists. "You're not going anywhere."

"Gaius will wonder where I am," Merlin countered, but he arched his hips off the bed, rubbing tantalizingly against Arthur until the smug smile dropped from his face and his head fell down to his manservant's shoulder with a groan. Merlin chuckled, bright and happy as he rolled his hips.

Arthur ground down, unable to not and gasped, "He can wait." He on the other hand, definitely could not. He released Merlin's wrists and put his hands on either side of the man's head instead, leaning down to capture his lips, cutting off any other words - but not sounds. Those tempting lips curved against his mouth and long, surprisingly dexterous fingers were everywhere, driving Arthur to distraction.

They could have come like that. They had before. But Merlin drew back and looked up at him with eyes dilated and wild with lust. "Inside me. Now."

He trembled a little and kissed Merlin fiercely, fingers fumbling for the jar they had left conveniently nearby. He slid down Merlin's body, sliding tongue and lips against pale skin. One finger, two, stretching as Merlin writhed on the bed and Arthur watched, amazed and proud that he could do this, that _he_ caused this. His tongue slid against the man's erection and Merlin cried out at the ceiling, thrusting shallowly into the touch. Teasing and ever-so-smug Arthur swirled his tongue around the tip, trying every trick to drive his lover crazy as he added a third finger - touched that spot inside him.

"Arthur!" Merlin gasped, writhing under his touch. "S-stop. I want you to be inside me."

Reluctantly, he did, missing the pressure of his cock, but perfectly willing to claim his lover, friend, and servant. He pulled himself up, and nuzzled Merlin's neck. "Now?" he asked slyly, rubbing at his entrance without actually committing.

"Prat," Merlin groaned. "Yes, yes, now! _Please_."

There was the word he was waiting for. He sheathed himself in tight heat and groaned, pushing one of Merlin's legs over his shoulders and both of them arching so he could rain feather light kisses on his face. Fervently, voice laced with desire, he groaned, "I love you."

Merlin stared up at him with eyes gone wide and full of happy bliss. He opened his mouth -

\- And the door banged open. Arthur jolted out of his sleep, sitting up with a gasp and staring at the fearful servant standing in the doorway. "Excuse me my lord! The door slipped! I was just - I'll leave your breakfast and go, sire."

"Do," Arthur growled and the girl scampered away. He fell back onto his bed, arms spread wide as he stared at the canopy, throat thick with some unnamed emotion. He hated those dreams. They were a reminder of what he had never had - and now might never.

It was the three hundredth and seventy-second day since Merlin had disappeared. One year, one week. Eleven months since his father had forced him to stop sending out searching patrols. Ten since he had visited Ealdor and found no Merlin, but a surprised and then worried Hunith. Eight since Gwen had lost a bit of her cheer. Six since Morgana looked at him only with sad eyes. Three since even _Gaius_ gave up. And just three weeks since the last of his knights had tentatively suggested perhaps Merlin was dead. Said knight was soon taught the error of his ways.

Everyone had given up on Merlin. The time since Arthur had given up? Didn't exist. It never would. Merlin was alive, and he would find him.

The amount of time since Arthur had said "I love you" was similar in that respect - he never had. Never had even the courage to hint at anything more than friendship.

When he found him, he would.

\----

On the three hundredth and seventy-second day since Merlin had disappeared, Morgana le Fay woke up and began to cry huge relieved sobs into her pillow for nearly an hour. Then the sobs changed to ones of despair as she realized what she had to do.

When Guinevere appeared with breakfast Morgana was sitting up, thinking about blue eyes flashing gold, a child nestled close, and guards with eyes that saw too much. She smiled weakly at her friend and servant and saw the sympathy in her eyes at the evidence of a hard night. "Anything you need, my lady?"

"No, thank you, Gwen. Actually..." she hesitated, looked at Gwen, memorizing her features, how she looked. The sweet face, trusting and giving her everything, anything she could ask for. "I would like a few more hours. To myself. I was... shaken, by the dream."

She regretted it instantly by the faintly hurt look on Gwen's face. "I could help if you like."

Gently shaking her head she stepped closer, laying a hand on her arm. "No, I just need a bit of time to think it through... but I'll see you at lunch?"

Instantly, Gwen's face lit up and Morgana smiled back. But her hand tightened slightly, swallowing. "Can I ask another favor before you go?"

A flash of blood and fire ran through her mind in the time it took Gwen to say. "Of course. You know you can ask anything of me."

"Yes," Morgana said, and wanted to cry. "One month from now - not before, you must promise - I need you to carry a message to Arthur."

"A month?" Gwen shook her head, puzzled and looking a little frightened. "Why can't you do it, my lady?"

"I'm afraid I'll forget," she lied, "Or convince myself the dream wasn't... it doesn't matter. Will you do it?"

"Yes," Gwen said. "I promise."

"This is the message: Merlin is alive. Just three words Gwen." She let her gaze flick away as Gwen's face flooded with surprise and joy. "You can't tell him before then."

"But - my lady, _Morgana_, your dreams are too often true - " Gwen protested, her face falling when Morgana peeked at her. "Even Arthur knows this - he'll be overjoyed - "

"I know," Morgana said firmly. "But it's important. It has to be a month. No sooner. Please, Guinevere. It... It could make a difference."

She knew it would. Not from her dreams, no, from knowing herself and knowing Merlin. It just wasn't the type of difference Guinevere was thinking of. She captured Gwen's gaze until finally, the girl nodded. "If it's important - One month exactly. I'll remember."

Smiling in relief she stepped back, her hand sliding away from Gwen's arm. "Thank you. You have no idea - enjoy the next few hours." Before Gwen could take that as the dismissal it should be she held up a hand, hurrying over to a set of drawers, and a small box that sat on top. "Wait. Here."

She held out a handful of coins, watcher her servant's eyes grow large. "My lady - I can't!"

"Count it as a bonus," she pressed the coins into Gwen's hands. "Please - I have nothing else to do with them - if you insist on them needing to be for something, buy yourself a new dress - or better yet use them to make a new sword."  
She smirked, just a bit, as Gwen flushed. The forge was not hers, not really - but the new blacksmith that had taken it over had been an apprentice of her fathers and let her use it when she needed to. They both knew that the new smith was not as good as Tom - and neither was Gwen, but she still could use it, something no woman was supposed to know. No one would ever stop Gwen - not with Arthur watching over both her and Morgana more ardently since Merlin's disappearance and assumed death.

"I look forward to lunch," Morgana said, a bit pointedly when Gwen looked like she was about to protest.

Gwen stared at the coins and shook her head, looking at her with that reproving expression she had that said volumes without be actually disrespectful. "I as well, Morgana."

Morgana kept on her smile until the door was closed, and then walked to the window. She stared out at the courtyard, counting thirty inhales, thirty exhales, giving Gwen times to get away, out of the castle. The she began to eat, knowing she would need her strength. The bread and cheese she wrapped up in a flimsy gauze that would be useless. Without Gwen's help, there were few things she could get into on her own - but that was fine. What she needed to get into wasn't any dress.

The tunic slipped over her head, the fine material shaped perfectly for her body. The trousers were the same - she remembered the horror of every tailor and seamstress she and Gwen had gone to until they found one who was old but skilled, a master in her field and cared not how many social taboos they were breaking. "I'm old," the woman had croaked. "What can they do? Kill me?"

They could, Morgana hadn't said. The woman was so old though - the challenge was worth it. Morgana slipped the sword out its hiding place in her room, then the second - she had no idea why she was taking the second, smaller sword she had used when she was first practicing, but the feeling in her gut said "Yes, this is right."

She belted them about her waist, and drew her chain mail out of its hiding spot, carefully packing it away. She packed it all in traveling bag, all the clothes meant more for battled, the boots she could actually wear outside the castle - nothing of her dresses... nothing that would really be missed. She grabbed only her jewelry and money, not caring now if they thought she had been robbed. As long as no one believed it Gwen - and Arthur would take care of her, she trusted him that far - she would let whatever happened, happen.

The bread and cheese wouldn't be much - but she had a hope that it wouldn't need to be much at all, that she wouldn't be long without another source. She swept on her thicker cloak, dark and green and heavy against spring's chill, and left. Her feet led her down the back corridors, any that were hardly used, or used only be servants who wouldn't dare challenge a lady, especially not the king's ward. People who wouldn't think to report it until asked directly.

The stabled were hardest to cross to, and she watched carefully until there were no knights, just peasants, and strode swiftly across, the bag trembling in her grip. She didn't even have a bedroll, she realized faintly, but strode on.

Her boots, hidden beneath the cloak, faltered only once. In a gap in the stables, she could see the training fields. Arthur stood there, moving in a pattern of six moves, the knights sparring behind him. Each move was graceful, perfect, and to a beat in his own head. One, two, three, four, five, six - sometimes it changed to two, two intricate moves or simple moves, it didn't matter. She watched for a moment, and her heart broke as the word was spelled out in his eyes for anyone to see. _M - E - R - L - I - N_.

She saddled her horse with fingers trembling. The stable hands gave her and odd look or two, but were used to the Lady Morgana doing strange things. Her back stayed straight, her expression beneath the hood of the cloak cool and confident. They would not see the way she ached inside from what she knew she had to do.

On her favorite horse - not the beautiful one for riding, not even the one given to her as a gift when she had been traveling with Uther a few years ago, but the one that had been bred as a war horse and come out unfit - something not perfect, not quite right. Too small, they had said, for a man in full armor. But a woman in chainmail? That was a different story.

Then, because she knew she shouldn't but she couldn't help herself, she grabbed the horse of Arthur's that had really been Merlin's. From the same breed and training as Arthur's own proud stallion, the mare Merlin had rode on seemed to be eager as she ordered it tacked, and led it out. She had no idea if the horse somehow knew - how many times had Merlin perhaps used magic on it? - or if it was just eager to get out. She had a feeling Arthur hadn't let anyone ride her except for short exercise runs in the entire year.

She rode out of the south gate, the mare tied to her stallion, both trotting. If anyone thought it odd, they didn't make her notice it. No one seemed to do more than glance at them, all busy with their own problems. Her hands shook on the reins, but her seat was perfect and the cloak was drawn up to put her clothes in shadows. Perhaps the peasants would think nothing of strange Lady Morgana in those clothes - they had seen them before. But she wanted nothing memorable about it today.

Once they were out of sight, she urged them into a canter, and then far enough down the road, swung them around, through the forest, in a slow, wide circle that would take them to the northern road. She rode them hard, not knowing how long she had, not knowing if she would miss her timing, if the events in her dreams would happen even if she was not there.

They burst onto the northern road at nearly lunch time and she pulled the reins, slowing them to a walk, and then stopping as she hid every bit of her aching unhappiness beneath a smug smirk, feeling a thrill of triumph at the man staring at her in shock. "You were coming for me?"

"Um," he said, and glanced down at the child - no, not the child he had been. A youth, not a man, but not quite just a child. There were shades of maturity on his face, some height on him now though he seemed nearly as skinny as the man beside him. "We were."

Morgana nodded, because she knew that, and then looked at the sunny, cloudless sky. "You should make it rain. Hard. In a wide area. They'll look for us."

"Yes," Merlin said, closing his eyes and opening them moment later wide, and golden. "We should ride."

They did, clouds rolling in behind them, washing away her tracks as back in the castle, Gwen opened the door and looked blankly inside Morgana's chambers, finding her lady was gone.

\----

One month after Morgana had disappeared (four hundred and two days after Merlin had disappeared) Arthur clenched his jaw, not sure who to be angriest at. His father, for caring so much about Morgana that he insisted on harder searches, longer, farther when for Merlin he had ordered them to stop, or at Morgana for running when lately all he wished to do was leave his leash behind and go.

A knock came at the door, recognizable in the way that he recognized few people's knock. A ghost of a smile slipped across his face, wan but there. He glanced over his shoulder at the door, leaning against the wall next to the window. "Come in, Gwen."

The door opened slowly, the Guinevere it revealed not at all what he expected. She had looked anxious and forlorn all month - but now she looked almost terrified. "Sire," she murmured as she closed the door and looked at him with huge, dark eyes.

"Is something wrong?" he asked, stepping forward. "Is - has someone hurt you?"

No one was allowed to hurt Gwen. Out of the three people he had come to be closest to, their friendships forged in battles and quiet times both, Gwen was the last. Merlin and Morgana would both never let him here the end of it if something happened to her in their absence. He was fully prepared to do battle with anyone, even his father, over Gwen.

"No, no," she said hurriedly. "It's nothing like that. It's... it's a promise I made. To lady Morgana."

Alarmed, he studied her, trying to calm his thoughts. "You said you didn't know why she disappeared."

"I don't!" she protested, shaking her head and he nodded slowly, eyeing her and trying to force the smile back onto his face, for him not to intimidate her so much. She wasn't easily intimidated - something was wrong.

Slowly, he sat down, gesturing to another chair that she took gratefully, he hands shaking a bit. "She said, exactly one month, to give you a message. Something - something about what she dreamed."

Arthur's fingers curled into the arm of his chair, his only reaction outwardly. Her dreams - he knew her dreams were important, and somehow wasn't surprised that they had something to do with her disappearance. Struggling to control his voice he asked, "What is the message, Guinevere?"

She trembled, and her eyes inches up from the table to meet his dead on. "Three words, sire. Merlin is alive."

He didn't move. He didn't even blink as he looked at her, quietly asking, "That was all?"

Her head bobbed, looking pained. "That was it. She said it was important you not know until today."

"Important," he said flatly. "Yes, of course it was."

"Sire," Gwen said, her expression suddenly anxious as she examined his features. "What will you do?"

"Do?" Arthur mused, cocking his head and smiling mirthlessly. "What a good question."

It came to him the instant the words were out of his mouth and he moved suddenly, standing and moving around, holding his hand to her. "Come. We're going to ask the person that has always seemed to know more about what is going on than he lets on. We will talk to the court physician."

She took his hand, let him pull her up and followed quietly - no, nod quiet, determined, her lips pursed, agreeing with him. Gaius knew more. Gaius always knew more.

Gaius was not in his chambers. Which was an odd thing - he had hardly left them since Merlin had gone, seeming especially anxious in the first months, when Arthur had searched Merlin's room for clues. Always been hovering - no, not hovering, Arthur realized with a strike of clarity. Standing. In the same spot, always.

"He's not here," Gwen said, frowning at a table full of small vials. Arthur stared at Merlin's room, nodding absently as she sighed, "I suppose he had to deliver some potions."

"Yes," Arthur said, stepping toward the door that had been so long taunting him, up the stairs he remembered only entering a few times - when Merlin was late, or when a search (for sorcery or clues) was being conducted.

"Sire?" Gwen called and Arthur wondered if anyone would ever call him Arthur again. Maybe he should ask Gwen if she wouldn't mind, if it wouldn't be too inappropriate.

He entered the small room and tried to place Gaius exactly. Near the bed - he crossed over, staring at the floor, not sure what he was looking for. Gwen's lighter, more cautious steps echoed behind him as he dropped to his knees. There was a floor board out of place, a little broken and he could see, from this close, that it was loose.

"Your highness?" Gwen called, closer, peering over his shoulder. His fingers curled in the floorboard, his other hand fisted in the material of his trousers. There had always been something about Merlin. Something hidden, just a touch, but it was _Merlin_. He had always suspected it was something embarrassing or silly and given it no other thought.

Yet, Gaius had stood in this very spot, not moving, hiding it for him long after Gaius even thought he was dead. He pulled up the floorboard, unsurprised to see the space beneath. The object inside - that was different. Multiple objects in fact, a few smaller ones clustered at the bottom. The main one though - that was the book. He touched it, his hand curving along the spine to pull it up and a pleasant tingle went down his spine.

He nearly dropped it because for a moment, it had _felt like Merlin_ and he took a deep breath, savagely cutting of all thoughts. "Gwen. You may not want to look. It - it could be..."

"I suspected, I think. Deep inside," she said, hushed, and he wondered how she had come to the same conclusion without having touched it. He laid the book in front of him and opened to a random page.

The spell there was familiar - not in words, but in what it was. "Ah," he murmured. "At least all of my life debts are in one place."

"He always cared too much," Gwen said, just as quiet as she crept closer, looking over his shoulder. "When did you see this?"

"When I was in the caves," he said, almost caressing the sketch in the book depicting the orb the spell conjured in hand of sorcerer and echoed in a larger orb. "It showed me the way out."

"He was muttering what I thought was gibberish in his fever," Gwen said, awed. "That was only a month into being here. He was - "

"Saving my life and endangering his own every time since the first," Arthur sighed. "He really is an idiot. We're going to have a long talk when I find him about the unacceptable chances one takes."

"Like facing deadly monsters and dark caves to grab a tiny flower to save your servant?" Gwen asked, adding a moment too late, "Sire?"

Arthur tilted back his head and gave her his first honest grin in a month. "That was a different matter entirely. As Crown Prince, I can do what I like."

"And as a servant, Merlin had a duty to serve," Gwen rejoined, a missing sparkle coming to her eyes. Her eyes flicked to the book and it dimmed in an instant. "Is this why he left?"

"If it were true, it would be acceptable." Arthur closed the book, and replaced the floorboard - but not the book. No, that was his now. "As this is Merlin, more likely it was something poorly planned and impulsive that landed him in terrible trouble. As he's alive, and obviously can't come back on his own, that leaves it to me to drag him back."

"Us," Gwen corrected firmly. She flushed at his surprised glance, the argument dying on his face as she met his scowl squarely with her own. "Merlin was my friend to - and Morgana is with him."

"We don't know that for sure," Arthur tried, but even he didn't believe it. That, and while usually Gwen was sweet natured and the least argumentative of the four of them, he knew that look meant, "I respect you entirely but I am doing this sire." It was a bit like Merlin's look of "You're a prat and you can't stop me" except without the inherent attitude.

Arthur missed that attitude.

"We, then," Arthur reluctantly admitted, and got to his feet. He glanced down at the book. "At least now we know other people to ask."

"We do?" Gwen asked, nervously glancing back into the physician's chambers. "Won't we still ask Gaius?"

"Oh yes," Arthur agreed. "But I doubt he'll have everything we need. No, but there are others." He smiled grimly. "Not even my father's purge could wipe out every sorcerer."

Gwen's eyes went wide, but Arthur was far beyond thinking of treason at that point. He loved his father - but he would not think of them as evil spellcasters, either Merlin or Morgana. They had magic. They were magic. They were not evil, and if he couldn't condemn a child that had done nothing, he could neither condemn two people who had done everything in their power to help him.

If they were willing to commit treason on his behalf, he would be no less brave - not when they had so much more to lose.

His father's rage was nothing in comparison to their lives.

\----

A month and a half after Morgana left Camelot, she watched Merlin teach the boy Mordred every clumsy move he remembered from Arthur and tried to hide her smiles. "I could teach him better, you know."

"You move differently," Merlin said, flushing a little as he avoided her gaze. "It was enough you provided the sword."

She exchanged an amused glance with Mordred and decided it was time for a distraction - of the serious sort. "You still need to explain many things to me. It has been over a month. They haven't found us yet - haven't even come close, somehow."

She glanced around, pointedly staring at the strange stones with their glowing runes on them then back at Merlin with a raised eyebrow. The "somehow" had been obvious since she had been led here, her and the horses having to fight a compulsion to get away, turn from their path - until they had been inside, and now even leaving the area did not make a difference.

"It was you," Merlin said abruptly, letting his sword fall. "In part, it was something you had seen. A few things actually. One was about the druids - and Mordred, though it took me awhile to figure that out. Another - Arthur was fighting with Uther. About magic being evil."

She stared at him, facts sinking in. There were a few things Arthur wouldn't ever speak out about - not directly. For individuals, he might, but on the subject by itself, Arthur knew better, they all knew better, than to say magic was not evil. That people were trying to use an evil force for good - they could try and spin that. Had in the past. But even she knew better to fight with him on the magic itself. She remembered dreaming that, sharing it with Gwen and Merlin in her fear and then waving it off. Arthur would never have done that.

Now she remembered Merlin going pale, and the way he had gone quiet as Merlin rarely did, not just quiet with his mouth, but in body, absolutely still. She closed her eyes, wishing she had never dreamed it, never told Merlin because she would rather have risked Arthur and Uther at odds than Arthur so unhappy as he was. "You were going to tell him. About you."

"Yes," Merlin admitted. "I had it all planned. He was going hunting that day."

Her dreams then had only just started to expand in time, the vaguer they were the farther forward. That one had been specific enough that... "Less than a week. That would have been less than a week before he went from at the very least being a bit distrustful of magic to - to fighting his father over it. Over you."

Merlin closed his eyes, looking pained as if she were tearing into a great wound. Mordred reached over and laid a hand on Merlin's arm solemnly and a voice echoed in both their heads. _'One day, your prince will know. That he would fight over you is a good sign of things to come. You have told me yourself the magic cannot be restored without Arthur. That was the best of signs.'_

"I couldn't do that to him," Merlin said warily. "And there was... more. Not... not anything concrete. But the druid visions you had - have they stopped?"

Morgana paused, thinking about it and - "Yes - about six months after you left."

_'That would do it,'_ Mordred said sounding relieved. Merlin grinned at him, so bright it hurt, almost like old - and it hurt more to realize it was an almost, that there was a spark named _Arthur_ missing from his eyes.

"Oh?" She asked pointedly, but Merlin had the audacity to smirk at her.

"Later," he brushed her off, "I'll explain about the druids."

"Mmm, Arthur will be interested in your new tattoos, I'm sure," Morgana said dryly and watched his face scrunch up in confusion. She sighed, but forwent remarking on it. One day, he would be reunited with Arthur and he would understand if she had to learn a spell to lock them in a dark, windowless room that only had a bed.

"Right," Merlin said uncertainly, still looking at her strangely. His hands folded tightly together despite Mordred's calming hand. "The rest - I... by itself it wouldn't have made me leave. But combined... I think I was attracting the magical beasts. Not that it couldn't have been Arthur, and I think in part it was. But us together was too much."

"Too much power and destiny," Morgana said quietly, "for those with magic not to be drawn to you. So you ran."

"It was... sudden. There were magical _rats_ and Arthur was going hunting and I couldn't _not_ tell him but I also couldn't tell him. He'll be a great king one day - but a prince and king at odds... only one person can rule in Camelot. He can't do that if he's dead. So I decided to correct a mistake I had made," he glanced at Mordred, almost wincing a Mordred smiled ruefully, hand curling on the man's arm, "and was just in time, in a way."

_'He saved me,'_ Mordred informed her. _'From myself. From the way we lived. He told me about Arthur, about the dragon and destiny, and how the dragon had been lying but he chose to make it true, and could have just as easily not. He could have walked away and let them die. But he didn't. For more than a year and a half after, he stayed. He told me they lied to me. I had a choice - and I wanted a choice. I... It had been easy. To begin to hate. Emrys almost didn't come. Then he explained why.'_

"And I realized we had both been slowly being manipulated by the old ways," Merlin said, eyes flashing in anger, hands turning white knuckled in their grip on each other. "Or at least those that spoke for them. Each step, each breath we drew they tried to direct."

_'They failed. I will be the greatest of them, a druid far surpassing their expectations - but I will not walk the stars say I should. I will walk with, not against. I believe Emrys - it is impossible not to.'_ Mordred smiled, loving and devoted, like the squires looked at the best of knights. Like he would follow Merlin into the depths of hell and back and do it without pause.

Morgana wondered what they had gone through to bond like this so swiftly - or had it been swift. Six months at least, if she was catching the hints right - possibly the entire year and more had been them, learning to be devoted to each other. She saw, like a thrill through her, how the three of them might be if they stepped back into Camelot. She saw them protecting, standing by Arthur and Gwen. Mordred - Mordred would be nearly as good with a sword and could protect Arthur on one side, Merlin on the other while she threw herself into the magic, drowning in it to protect them all with her dedication and skill as Mordred did with his knowledge, Merlin with his power. She trembled with it, this new changed fate. "We will be incredible - what you have done, whatever fate you have pushed aside, I am glad you have."

"So am I," Merlin said fervently, and Morgana reached out and clasped both their hands, one in each of hers and felt the circle complete itself. Merlin's lips curved up into a secretive smile she only now recognized for what it was. "Do you want to learn?"

She paused only a moment before she threw her head back and laughed. "I thought you would never ask."

\----

Four hundred and sixty seven days after Merlin had disappeared, Arthur and Gwen rode into a druid encampment hidden at the edge of Camelot's lands. It wasn't so much of a town as odd shelters made from the trees above, their branches wrapped around each other to make roofs, sometimes walls while others just hung above wagons. Even the wagons were difficult to make out, nature itself hiding them from watchful eyes.

An old man stood out in gray robes, staring at them with wary eyes. "Arthur Pendragon. We remember our debt to you." There was something dark in the man's eyes, a cruel twist to his lips, there and gone again. "A son trying to make up for a father's unforgivable sins. Ask what you will."

He stiffened in the saddle, but Gwen shifted in her saddle next to him, not touching at all but just somehow leaning closer like her presence would brush him, calm him. He took a steadying breath. "I want to ask you about a warlock named Merlin. I need - "

A cry of outrage interrupted him and suddenly there were a flurry of bodies melting from the trees in front of them, out of wagons and houses grown from trees, all faces twisted in anger, grief, or disbelief. The old man drew himself up, the staff he was carrying raised up and shaken, something at the end jangling in a clear, bell-like sound. "Silence! Why do you want the traitor Emrys?"

"Traitor?" Gwen asked while he recovered his surprise, her honest confusion better than he could have managed at the hilarity of Merlin being called a traitor. There was no one in the world more loyal. Gwen leaned forward. "Why do you call him traitor?"

"More nine moons have passed since he stole away in the night with the child that would be our savior," the druid intoned, glaring at them fiercely. "He brainwashed the child and they disappeared from our sights."

Instantly, Arthur's curiosity faded, his gaze becoming cool. "His name is Merlin." They didn't know where he was - but he had been here. "Where did he go?"

"He tried to say the same thing many times," the man jeered, brown eyes glaring into Arthur's soul. "But we know his name as it is written in the sky."

"Where. Is. He?" Arthur punctuated each sentence by gripping the reins tighter, sword hand twitching with the need to force the answers out of them. Merlin had been here. He didn't care about the child, not right now.

"If we knew, your _highness_," the man said, the title coming off mocking and derisive and not in the friendly way Merlin had made it sound, "we would not be so angry. We would have gone after him and killed him for his insolence."

Instantly, one hand fell to his sword and he saw Gwen had done the same on her own hip. Fury rose, turning his blood hot and he took three deep breaths, remembering he was a prince, not a savage - and they had not found Merlin. He was safe. Alive. He wouldn't approve of killing these people. "Be glad you did not. If I find he has died at your hands, my father will seem like a pleasant daydream in comparison."

A few raised their hands and he could see the words shaping on their lips. He curled his mouth into a smile that bared his teeth. "If I die, Morgana le Fay will know - and she will tell Merlin. He's very loyal you know."

He half expected that somehow, this would make them _all_ target him - instead it made them drop their hands, mouths closing, faces pale with fear. Even the man looked shaken and someone whispered something that sounded like _destiny_ and _love_ that made him want to be mortified except he had the strange idea they weren't talking of him - certainly it wasn't his power of steel and bone that made them afraid.

"He'll destroy us," he was sure he heard someone whisper, "if the prince dies," and the people seemed to melt back a little, leaving their leader staring at him, studying.

"This time," the man growled, "we will let you go. But our debt is repaid, a life for a life - and when we get the child back, Arthur Pendragon, not even Emrys will be threat enough. The kinder among us may have been pleased with you - but blood rings true. Magic power rises, Prince Arthur, and so must yours fall."

"Must it?" Arthur smiled back at them, every inch the charming prince as he turned his stallion around, Gwen silently doing the same. Wanting to laugh, he called back, "Merlin might have something different to say about it."

They rode through the woods and Gwen looked at him sidelong, waiting until they were out of earshot. "They were scared of him. Of - Of _Merlin_."

"Yes," Arthur said thoughtfully, a small smile on his face. "I'll have to congratulate him on that."

Gwen looked at him like he was missing the point entirely. Arthur knew better. He had picked up on the point exactly. Merlin was traitor - to them. Stolen their greatest asset in the form of a child.

If Merlin could make headway on a stubborn prince, one child would be a piece of cake for him.

\----

The bandits Morgana had dreamt of surrounded a man. There were too many, too many even if the man had been Arthur and he wasn't. He was dark haired and familiar and she heard Merlin gasp, turning from surprise to protective anger. Instantly she knew, this man was one of _theirs_. It was the same anger, that note in Merlin's choked voice, that she heard when he hunted an enemy of Arthur's or when he spoke of Gwen's father - or Mordred and what they had been teaching him.

She didn't know the man - but if he was Merlin's then he was hers too and she pulled out her sword, riding in, the horse's strides matching Merlin's mare. Mordred pulled his own short sword, sitting in front of Merlin, and slipped off as they rode into the bandits, tackling the first to the ground.

Merlin had no sword, something she had always thought quite foolish until she realized he needed none - the staff of the sidhe he had taken with him (the only thing he had taken with him, she sometimes thought) was as unbreakable as any sword and more powerful. Merlin himself, if he knew the words or had the time to think, likely could have killed them all. She thought maybe he knew that, by the haunted look he sometimes had. It was easier in some ways, to fight close and feel their deaths, remind themselves they were still human.

She fought from the horse until someone pulled her off shrieking and snarling a spell that turned their blood to ice. Her sword slid smoothly in between ribs, to cut and slash and in the end, run them through. They had little armor, just leather, but there were many of them. She backed away from three coming to her at once and found herself pressed back to back with the familiar stranger.

Then it was almost a dance - even better when Mordred and Merlin were backed into them and the four of them stood backs pressed closer, Mordred and Merlin muttering spells like they had been born to it. Sometimes she believes they had. A sword came to close to her and it suddenly flew from the bandit's hand, imbedding itself in a tree and she knew Merlin was getting frantic, angry, afraid - it would be over soon.

The man cried out, hit hard in the space between armor and that was the end. The bandits went flying, trees coming up to grapple with them, spearing them in suddenly broken branches, rocks moving so that they hit their heads and in a few, fire responding out of nowhere, engulfing them. It ended suddenly, with only a few alive, groaning on the ground.

The man turned and she saw his eyes, remembered him from Gwen's wistful smiles and his own blinding, honest ones - like the one he greeted Merlin with, eyes warm and smile relieved, welcoming, old friends meeting again. "Merlin! Once more I am in your debt. I would surely have perished without the aid of you and your companions."

"Lancelot," Merlin greeted, one word holding such warmth that Morgana felt a smug sense of triumph take hold. _Ours_, she tested, thinking - and yes, he was. When they reunited with Arthur and Gwen, they would be happy to have him back. Perhaps they could gift wrap him in the best sword and shield they could find (he already had armor made by Gwen's father) and use him as an apology.

"It's good to see you again, Lancelot," she said, her voice near a purr. If Arthur and Merlin belonged to each other even more than they did the rest of them, then surely she could have both Lancelot _and_ Gwen. He turned to her and his eyes widened in recognition. She laughed a little, putting her off hand on his sword arm. "Surprised?"

"My lady," he said, voice devoid of anything but pure surprise as he glanced at the sword in her hand, traveling down to her boots and up to the obvious curve of her thighs, the tunic that clung to her sweaty body, the chainmail, the hair pulled back sharply away from her face. He flushed as she slowly arched an eyebrow, beginning to stutter like an untried boy. "I - I did not mean any offense. It is just not... often that one sees a woman in battle."

"Nor a peasant made a knight," she said gently, grinning fiercely as Merlin backed away a step to give her the way in. "Yet, you are knight in everything but the King's word."

"I could say the same to you, my lady," Lancelot said, inclining his head to her bloodied sword. Still grinning, she wiped it off on a dead man's tunic. Lancelot still looked a little uncertain, but with Merlin beaming encouragement at him and Mordred's quite, considering presence he seemed to regroup. "May I ask what you're doing out here?"

"Reshaping destiny," Merlin said, casual as if he was talking of the weather. "Do you want to join us? Mordred could use a teacher." He looked at the boy. "Lancelot's one of the best - you'll find few better."

"If you trust him," Mordred said clearly, his eyes flicking to her and Merlin and back, obviously putting them both in this, "then I shall as well."

There was no such thing as a leap of faith with them, Morgana knew. No, they were all endlessly running across cliffs and jumping rivers, trusting that even if they didn't make it, the others would catch them. Her grin was a predator's smile and Merlin eyed her, the mock wariness in his eyes making her grin wider. "What do you say, Sir Lancelot? We have a nice little hovel hidden up a nearby mountain. Come and join our tiny family of rogue sorcerers?"

"What of Arthur?" Lancelot asked, concerned and so loyal that Morgana's breath caught and if she hadn't know already that he was _theirs_ that would have cinched it. She saw Mordred's eyes go wide with awe at the far-reaching loyalty that it seemed both Merlin and Arthur somehow managed to gain from the best of the best.

"Every action I take is for him," Merlin said simply, flushing a little under her delighted gaze. "I left for his protection."

The knight (even if not in name) beamed at him, as if he had suspected no less and then turned a shyer smile onto Mordred. "It would be my honor, if you would accept me as a teacher. I am only of modest skill, but I will pass everything I know onto you."

"I saw you," Mordred returned softly. "In battle. You are modest, but not of skill. You will be my teacher."

If there was one thing she and Mordred definitely had in common, it was that quick possessiveness. She thought sometimes that could have been what they would eventually use to turn him from Arthur more than anything else - but Merlin taught him he could share and still have what he wanted. He could share Merlin with Arthur and still have his mentor and brother, though brother and sister was not enough for the magic-deep kinship they felt for each other, the three of them. Now that possessiveness latched onto Lancelot and Morgana grinned fiercely for it was one more thing that would tie Mordred to the shape of destiny _they_ wanted, and not what had been foreseen.

"Come on then," Merlin said, smiling fondly. "Let's go home."

"After we find my horse, perhaps?" Lancelot asked, glancing around ruefully. "I'm afraid he ran off."

"That was a present from Arthur, wasn't it?" Morgana met Merlin's eyes as she asked. Merlin nodded and she wondered if he had been the one to saddle it, to see Lancelot off as the man carried Merlin's secret with him, cherishing it and taking care, seeing something the rest of them had blinded themselves to.

They could use that, Morgana decided. Lancelot would not be blind to things simply because of expectations. Her eyes glowed with warmth and she glanced at Mordred, who always had better luck with this than they did. "Can you call him?"

"I can try," Mordred promised, and the call went out.

She locked her arm into the crook of Lancelot's elbow as Merlin gathered their own horses and felt a little bit more whole, a little bit more like a piece of her had come home. She could be patient - the rest would come in time.

\----

Five hundred and fifty four days after Merlin had disappeared (and roughly six months after Morgana had, but Arthur didn't obsessively count each day since, he left that to Gwen. Counting for one was enough) he and Gwen marched down the stairs to see the dragon that Gaius had finally - _finally_ \- admitted might have some answers. A year and half plus some change after Merlin had first gone (gods, Arthur had nearly known Merlin as long as he had been gone at this point) they traversed into the darkness with only a torch, a sword, and a fervent _need_ between them.

He stood on the ledge and blinked out at the cave. It was not what he had expected. Huge and dark - he could hear a distant river far beneath. He wondered if the dragon was fed - or if it lived off of magic and water, half starving beneath the castle. Anger churned in Arthur's gut at his father, an emotion that was becoming too common as the rift grew. It had cracked open at Morgana's disappearance, wider and wider as Uther blamed him for Morgana not being home and Arthur blamed his father for neither of them being _able_ to come home. Or at least they must think so - he would fix that, when he found them. He would tie them each to their beds - or Morgana to hers and Merlin's to his own, depending on his mood at the time.

"Dragon," he called, the fury in his voice from Gaius' silence making his voice growl. "I, Arthur Pendragon, have come to ask of your knowledge."

"And I, Guinevere, daughter of the blacksmith and maidservant to Lady Morgana," Gwen added, her voice echoing down, down into the cave, this huge underground world.

Harsh, bitter laughter answered them. "Young Pendragon. This is something I did not see. Your other half denied me his presence after he killed Nimueh, except for once. Why do you come here when he would not?"

Nimueh. He knew that name. Killed - Merlin had killed her. He shoved it away and back, something else to ask Merlin about when he found him - he only left himself wonder briefly which of them had been targeted by Nimueh that time. Morgana, perhaps - she had said he wouldn't be killed by her hands. Merlin wouldn't kill unless she had done something awful, or was going to do something. He breathed in, breathed out, and asked, "You don't know where he has gone, then?"

There was a shift, metal clinking against stone and something heavy and large suddenly dropping from far above, a chain slinking down below it. Arthur stayed still and pretended he was as brave as everyone thought as he let Gwen grasp onto him, terrified, and her slid an arm around her protectively, ready to shield her with his body as the grand creature dropped onto the craggy outcropping in front of them, settling in as if it had been shaped for him. "He truly has gone then? He came to me just once, to have a theory of his confirmed. I was proud that he had begun to think of things for himself - but he would hear nothing else from me. I had hoped that my help would have encouraged him down here again. I did not think he would truly leave you, my king."

_Neither did I_, Arthur didn't say, instead snapping, "I am not king yet."

"You have always been king. The only king many of us, the creatures of the old way, will ever bow to. Some may choose the other path - but it is you that the stars have sung about for millennia, and it is you we have waited for. You and the boy." The dragon curled its tail about, sounding faintly amused and much less bitter than moments ago. It cocked its head, peering up and away. "He is a strange one. He has fought and defeated many parts of his destiny - but you he willingly gives himself to. The old ways will have to be content with that, since he and they are shifting everything else."

"They?" Gwen dared to ask, unwrapping herself from around him, taking a brave, hopeful step closer to the edge. She looked less frightened than _he_ did, enchanted even and he wondered if there was something in the peasant class that gave them some sort of unwitting attraction to magical creatures. Those this was a far cry from the unicorn. "You know of my lady."

It was a statement, not a question. The dragon chuckled, a sound that resounded all around them, bouncing off the walls to echo louder into their ears. "The whole world can feel them as they move now. I had hoped they were still in Camelot, that the feel of them was when they left on missions. But it was a foolish hope. Druid, Seer, Knight - and Warlock." The dragon looked at them and inclined his head to Arthur. "King." Then to Gwen, "And Heart - once I would have said you were so much more - but now I am not so sure. In name, perhaps you will be. But in truth - so much even I did not expect."

"What are you talking about?" Arthur demanded, for once in his life not wanting the vague talk of court. "Speak plainly - surely you were not this way with Merlin, he never would have understood a thing."

"He often did not," the dragon replied, his eyes laughing at Arthur. "But I have said all but one thing, one hint if you so wish to find them - Wait for danger to come to you. They will follow at its heels."

"No!" Gwen cried before he could. "We need to find them."

"No," the dragon said. "They need to find you." It laughed as it threw itself into the air, the last words coming down to them as the chain slithered like a snake after it. "At least I will not be bored."

Arthur stared after it, processing. He knew it was up there, knew he could rage and scream and maybe three years ago, when he and Merlin had just met at the end of a glorious summer, he would have. But through two autumns and winters, another glorious summer and just one and a half springs he had changed - and two more summers without Merlin had taught him even more. Patience, for one, and when being a prat was worth it and when it would drive those he wanted near him away.

He looked at Gwen. "Winter will be coming again soon."

"Yes," she said, puzzling over him, her eyes sweeping his expression for a clue. "It will, sire."

He nodded thoughtfully, and led them back up the stairs, dousing his torch as they entered into the light of the castle dungeons. He waited until they were past the guards and up another flight of stairs before saying, "We should hurry if we want to get them home before winter. There are only so many magical creatures I can stir up before first snowfall."

"Didn't the dragon say wait?" Gwen asked, her eyes large and fingers trembling but not saying _no_, not even in that "I respectfully disapprove" way of hers.

"Yes, he did," Arthur agreed pleasantly.

He had learned to be patient when it was important, and when it was not and he would need to take it by force.

\----

Morgana awoke not with a gasp but with a start, her mind grasping at the details she had dreamed and her throat croaking out a spell that made the parchment waiting for her fly into her hands. She rose up, sitting on the mattress and placing the parchment on the bench of the table near their "beds". As swiftly as possible, she wrote down the details. It wasn't often anymore that she had dreams that were so immediate - many times they had days, weeks, even months or, for a very few, years to prepare for. She wrote them all time, and tried to guess at the immediacy to them.

This one was soon - within days, and far enough away that they would need every bit of spare time to stop it. Magic had helped hone her ability, and Mordred, Merlin, and Lancelot had all spilled their blood with hers to keep her grounded and sane so when the more frantic dreams (like this one, she knew) would not put her wild and on edge, creeping closer to madness as they had slowly begun to when the Questing Beast had shown its face.

Despite how quiet she had been, the beds (mattresses on the floor, woven from straw because as hardy peasants as the boys were and as tough as she was, they did have the money and Merlin had gotten used to mattresses) were pressed tight together and Mordred had awoken from either the jolt of her body or thoughts, and Merlin wasn't far behind. Once he sat up, Lancelot stirred and by the time she had the basic details down, all of her boys were waiting for her (all but one) to finish. Her quill scribbled down one last detail before she drew back, rereading the hurried thoughts and landscape and then she glanced up, meeting Merlin's eyes. "We have to go. Arthur will need us."

"Are you sure this isn't one of his attempts to draw us out?" Merlin asked, more than a bit suspicious (and amused) of that now. Morgana sometimes wondered if the game they were playing was a very complicated flirtation between the two at this point. Arthur _had_ to know they were the ones protecting them from afar and Merlin had to know that he knew.

Morgana looked at Mordred, studying the boy who was thirteen now, grown enough that the resemblance between him and the child he had been was barely visible. To her it seemed obvious - but to Uther, who had only seen druids... "Yes. It is time."

She saw all three of them glance at each other and she stood, a smirk growing at the look of trepidation and anticipation on Merlin's face, Lancelot's nervous excitement and Mordred's wide-eyed trembling. "We've been away from them too long."

"Are you sure?" Merlin asked, looking at her, waiting for her to indicate she had seen something, that her Sight was granting her this, and not just her own impulse, her own thoughts. She raised an eyebrow at him and cocked her head, smiling slow and wicked. It was all the answer he would get.

"I am glad we... acquired new horses," Lancelot said, fumbling over the true word, the _stole_ that he wouldn't say. "I do not believe Carys will leave her filly."

"She shouldn't," Merlin agreed, quick to defend the newest member of their family. "She's still so tiny."

Morgana remembered the "tiny" filly gleefully stomping on a poisonous and mystical snake just last week and thought that Merlin could sometimes be a bit blind to the things he loved. The fact that the filly had been born pure white and blue eyed was stranger still, and all of them were very quiet about anything being wrong with the filly. As it turned out, she had been perfect - nothing less. She would have liked to blame it on Arthur's stallion, but more likely it had been their magic (and the fact that Carys had been constantly in the presence of it since shortly after her conception - really, it wasn't like anyone had told her that Arthur's stallion had broken out of his stall the week before she left and they had found her two hours after it was much too late) that had altered the filly slightly. Perhaps there would have been something wrong with her, or perhaps their magic had bleached the color from her. As it were, the filly was strong, and looked like she would be a credit to her sire's line, as well as her dam.

She wasn't afraid of magic at all, either. Privately, Morgana kind of wished she were older - she would be an excellent horse to ride under any sorcerer. The fact of it was, she was much too young. "We'll leave her and Carys here. We can have them brought in later, when we've made sure we can... When we're settled."

Mordred's expression tightened and she sighed at her misstep. He knew now that he was at least half the reason they stayed. Him, and the fact it had been... easier, in some ways, to dedicate themselves away from Camelot. But protecting Arthur from afar could only do so much, and Mordred was old enough. "We'll be fine," she assured him. "Arthur won't let anything happen to us. But we need to leave _now_. All of Camelot was in danger."

That spurred them on to action as little else could. She rolled up the parchment and stuffed it into the closest saddle bag, food following next, then a bedroll. Books were left behind - they were useless in battle - and weapons were taken up. All of them had swords now, and daggers, and she stopped Merlin from picking up the staff. "There will be too many people about."

Reluctantly, he let it go, leaning it back against the wall in its place near their beds. More than once he had rolled out of bed to grab staff first and twisted around to face whatever had woken him - only once had an intruder managed to get through their defenses, and the man had been half mad. The other times... Even Merlin was not spared his share of bad dreams. He laid a hand on the staff regretfully, and then moved off to saddle his horse - and likely would start on hers if she didn't hurry out there in time.

Despite that, she lingered in their tiny home, her eyes sweeping the small place. It hadn't been much, a place to shelter in during winter and in the night, but it had been as much of a home if not more than her chambers in Camelot. Here there had been no expectations and she had run roughshod over her boys with as much power as any King. Here they had thrown flour at each other when Merlin and Lancelot had fumbled through teaching them bread and half the flour had ended up on their clothes instead of in the ovens. Here - she would never see again as a home. She knew that, knew this was the end.

Soon, it would just be another hut - but no one else would ever live in it. Somehow, she knew that. It would forever be theirs.

She turned away and went through the door, her mouth already open to yell at Merlin before her eyes even registered him sheepishly tacking her horse. In some ways, this had been her home - in others, she traveled with her home, and soon she would be whole.

\----

On the seven hundredth and thirty third day since Merlin had disappeared (and Merlin had officially been gone longer than he had been in Camelot, damn his stubborn hide) Arthur was backed up to a tree, right shoulder partially in front of Gwen and staring at the many, many gryphons wheeling in the sky like so many misshapen hawks. "I am beginning to think magic may have indeed played a part in the defeat of the gryphon," Arthur said gravely, a mischievous twinkle in his eye as he met Gwen's gaze.

"Just thinking that now?" Gwen asked, her hands white with the tightness of her grip on the hilt of her sword. "I think Sir Lucan's sword shattering on the one's hide would have been a clue."

"Sometimes I think the magical part of this world mocks me," Arthur said, very much aggrieved. It really wasn't fair at all. "Other kingdoms don't seem to have half as many magical problems."

"Other kingdoms also didn't kill off all their magicians, begging your pardon sire," Gwen answered, not really sounding sorry at all but more as if she was more than a bit exasperated with him.

He narrowed his eyes and glanced at her sidelong. "I still think it's not fair."

"Maybe you can tell them that?" she suggested sweetly and yes, Morgana _had_ rubbed off on her - or maybe that was him. At least, that's what someone else had said. Someone who might have been very useful right then (marginally, slightly - not that Arthur had gone and grilled Gaius for every time his life had been saved by a certain someone or anything) if only he hadn't been frolicking off somewhere with Morgana for the past year.

"It seems I'll get the chance." He sighed and held out his sword, determined to die protecting her, even if the creature diving for them would likely only kill her shortly after. He would tell her to run, but he had learned that while Gwen _seemed_ perfectly obedient and respectful she went conveniently deaf whenever he ordered her to do simple things like "Run" or "Not come after me when I jump into the lair of this three headed snake monster" and other such very ordinary commands.

It wasn't that she deliberately and obviously disobeyed or yelled at him like Merlin or Morgana - she instead gave off an air of puzzlement, as if he had never issued such a strange order. He had quite given up on getting her to leave his side in battle. Truly, at least it was a real friend at his side.

Just as the gryphon swooped down, its wings curling slightly, back arched and front claws forward like a stooping hawk, there was a flash of a sword to the side and suddenly a man was in front of them and the gryphon shrieking in angry fear, one of its wings somehow cut clean through so it writhed on the ground, screeching its bloody head off.

_How did you do that_, Arthur wanted to demand but instead Gwen went "_Lancelot_?" like it was the most incredible thing she had ever seen, as if _he_ was the most wondrous, wonderful thing she had ever seen and he turned slightly, and yes, it _was_ Lancelot. With a sword glowing with blue flame which was much more terribly important.

Arthur scrambled away from his tree, looking into the forest and not caring that his back was now to the gryphon. There was only one reason Lancelot's sword could be glowing that way. "Merlin? Merlin! Where are you?"

"He's coming, your highness," Lancelot said behind him, calm and polite as if there wasn't a fierce creature about to attempt to kill him. "He was a bit delayed."

"I have called him," a new voice said, both familiar and not and a boy stepped out of the woods, not yet a man grown but with the gangly limbs of one who was growing into himself. He held a short sword in his hand, as naturally as if he had been born to it. Arthur absently made a note to test him if they survived, for as good as Lancelot was, it wouldn't do to have the child be taught wrong.

"You're Mordred," Arthur mused. "I remember you. A bit smaller then."

"It has been a few years," Mordred said, in such a way and without tone that Arthur wasn't sure if the boy had meant that to sound insulting or if it was a simple statement. Then again, if he had been around Morgana and Merlin - "You really aren't terribly bright, are you?"

Arthur sighed and looked over at Lancelot - who was busy fighting the gryphon. He couldn't really be counted on for sympathy against subjects that were terribly disobedient anyway. He glanced back at the boy and waved his sword. "Can you do it then?"

The boy's eyes focused on their swords with such an intense look that it sent shivers down Arthur's spine. The answer came in the words of a spell, perfectly intoned, and the air seemed to shiver with the power of them. Arthur's sword began to glow blue, a warm feeling flickering at his core. He jerked a nod to the boy. "Thank you."

Then both he and Gwen were there, next to Lancelot and though he was annoyed, he wasn't surprised to see the child there, dodging and using his smaller mass to roll _beneath_ the creature, thrusting upward. The gryphon screamed, throwing its head back and all three of them launched forward, swords sliding into the neck in unison for a killing blow - that made the gryphon explode. Arthur fell back, surprised at the sudden lack of resistance and could only think that it was much tidier than he had expected.

Then he looked up, where dozens more still flew. "One down."

"They aren't ours to worry about," Lancelot told him, lending him a hand up, his palm warm and callused. "Watch."

"I _am_ \- Oh." Arthur blinked as suddenly, one by one and then two by two the creatures fell from the sky. There seemed to be no reason for it - just suddenly they collapsed in midair and fell like a very awkward rain to land on the earth unmoving. He watched one as it crashed through the trees not far from them. "Are they dead?"

"No," Mordred answered. "Sleeping - for a hundred years."

"Just a hundred?" Arthur said. "I just don't know if that will be long enough. If we start now, and only kill one a year each... we'll still have killed them all before a decade has passed."

"Yes," Mordred agreed. "Next time I'll be sure to ask them for only five minutes. Then we can rush around trying to kill them all with glowing swords and hope your father doesn't see us. Would that be preferable?"

"My apologies, sire," Lancelot said, though his lips were twitching into a smile. "Merlin and Morgana may have influenced the child. Slightly."

"Slightly?" Gwen asked, a giggle to her voice he hadn't heard in too long. "I don't think they ever do things by halves."

"Quarters and wholes, really," a new, annoyingly cheerful and ever so welcome voice said. "Halves are just messy."

Arthur turned, studying the scrawny body standing there in clothes not terribly dissimilar to what he had worn before. Blue tunic, red neckerchief - the brown cloak instead of the jacket was new, but it was still cold at night so Arthur could allow him that. His hair wasn't even longer - in fact there was a sharpness to it that said it had been recently cut. There were no new visible scars - but that didn't mean he shouldn't look for them.

That was his intention as he stalked over, prowling forward like a cat on the hunt. Merlin watched him, nervous but not afraid, not wary, just waiting for him to come - until Arthur was in his face, hands on his shoulders, and forcing him back, step by step until his back was to a tree. Then there was confusion, but Arthur watched for anything else - no fear, no rejection. "Arthur, wh - "

_That_ was what he had been waiting to hear, for _years_ and it was entirely Merlin's fault that he jerked the other man's head back with a fierce grip in his hair and claimed his mouth with a roughness he might thought he might later regret as there was little sweet in it - just possessive and _Yes, this_. Except Merlin wasn't struggling, was pushing back, pushing into it, opening his mouth willing under him and Arthur trembled inside as he ravaged Merlin's mouth. One of them was making embarrassing noises but he was too busy working his other hand beneath Merlin's tunic (checking for scars of course, why else) to try and work out which of them it was. He decided it was Merlin because _he_ would never be moaning so obviously from just a kiss - even if Merlin's hands were _everywhere_.

He actually snarled when a hand landed on his shoulder, glaring behind him at Lancelot's embarrassed face. "What?"

"Perhaps this can wait?" Lancelot suggested, and Merlin made a strangled noise that sounded a bit like a _NO_ to _him_ and Lancelot raised an eyebrow, looking past him at Merlin, despite him trying to shift to block his view because Merlin looked more edible than usual with his lips red and swollen and his body arched into Arthur's, eyes dilated and wide. The knight (or not really, Arthur knew, but he was at the same time) coughed and looked around. "Mordred is a little young to see this."

"Mordred was raised by _druids_," Merlin whined, but then sighed, dislodging Arthur's hands, despite the outraged glare he got. He had liked his hands where they were, thank you very much. "Arthur, there are probably things we should talk about before we - "

"No there aren't," Arthur cut him off. "You're a sorcerer, you've saved my life more than any one person has the right to, and you're coming back to Camelot if I have to tie you up to do that."

Merlin gave him a smirk that was uncannily like Morgana and said, "We can try the last one later, but really - trees aren't terribly comfortably."

"How do you know?" Arthur demanded and he wasn't being overly aggressive about this, no matter what Gwen's sigh behind him said. Just because he was already making plans to hunt people down meant _nothing_.

"I know because of right _now_," Merlin said and the sweet reunion part apparently just wasn't meant to be because already Merlin sounded like he was saying "you prat" and Arthur found himself highly annoyed and maybe a little amused.

Still... "I have a tent. Somewhere."

"And your father and a large group of knights that you were separated from that _might_ think something is a bit suspicious when we come waltzing in right after the gryphons all fell out of the sky like - like - " Merlin paused, trying to find the words.

"Rain," Arthur offered, mostly so Merlin would go on speaking more and he could keep breathing the same air and telling himself Merlin was _there_ and not another dream.

"Sure," Merlin said agreeably, not sounding like that had been what he was looking for but he went with it anyway. "And anyway, your armor is cold."

"You could take it off," Arthur suggested, leaning in for another kiss and thrilled when Merlin let him get away with it. This time he did it right, sweet and slow and felt his knees weaken a bit (it was the adrenaline levels dropping, the _adrenaline_) before he reluctantly backed away with a happy sigh he would eternally deny ever leaving his mouth. "I hope you have a gift for me. You have been gone for ages."

"The gryphons weren't enough?" Merlin asked, nudging at him impatiently so that he was forced (under protest) to actually not be breathing Merlin's air anymore and take a step back. And then another because apparently Merlin wanted _room to stand_ or something silly like that. "I've never given anyone gryphons before."

Lancelot coughed and Arthur pointed at him triumphantly. "You gave Lancelot a gryphon!" Then he paused and narrowed his eyes, suddenly cutting the (possible traitorous and actually very shoddy) knight with a cold glare. "You were sharing his bed."

Lancelot actually went pale and Merlin groaned - and hit him upside the head. "I was not sleeping with Lancelot. You know, I thought _Morgana_ was possessive of us, but its some silly noble thing isn't it? There's only one person in Camelot I want to end up in bed with, Arthur, and he's a great big prat who is ungrateful and shows no gratitude at _all_ even though I saved his life _again_."

"Mordred bespelled my sword," Arthur sniffed, smiling at the boy who looked at him with bemusement, gaze going from him to Merlin as if they were the strangest thing he had ever seen. "Perhaps when I'm King _he'll_ be Court Sorcerer."

Mordred blinked slowly, then looked at Merlin and in a small, apologetic voice said, "I'd actually rather be a knight."

There was a long, long pause and then Merlin said with a sigh, "I thought you might." Arthur found expectant, pleading blue eyes looking at him and Arthur was ready to say yes before he even knew what the question was. "I know he's probably not a noble, but Morgana's basically adopted him and maybe not right now and it could be too soon to be making plans for when you're king at all but - "

"Yes," Arthur answered, almost positive he knew what he was answering. "I was planning to open the knighthood up as it was once I am king. I'm sure Mordred will make an excellent addition by then, or at very least a squire if he is not yet ready."

Merlin beamed at him and Arthur didn't even trying to resist - he kissed him again, pulling the warlock toward him and not caring that Lancelot was probably blushing up a storm or Gwen squeaking behind him. All he cared about was -

"_Finally_," a voice muttered as Morgana appeared from the woods behind them. "I knew one of you would have had to do _something_ when you saw each other again." She looked him up and down scathingly. "I suppose it only makes sense it was you. You always were more aware of your baser urges."

Arthur tightened his grip on Merlin's shoulder even as they drew away, keeping him close to his side, stung at the implication - but Morgana was smiling and here and he was, for once, too happy to pick at her. Not when Gwen was running into her lady's arms and interrupting anything he would have tried to say anyway. Disappointingly, they did not kiss. "I feel that is tragically unfair."

"Huh?" Merlin asked and Arthur looked from where the two women were standing to his warlock's expression which was arranged in a familiar expression of confusion - and not the fake one that he was sure he could now recognize if he saw it.

"Never mind," he said, his sigh that of one who had to endure many hardships, mostly including idiots who couldn't be bothered to keep up with his thought process. "We should go find the rest of my knights."

"Um," Merlin said, eyeing him. "Do you actually listen to the words that come out of my mouth?"

"Yes," Arthur answered immediately because he did, actually, want Merlin to _not_ run off again and in one of Merlin's most serious moods he had told Arthur to _listen_ so awful things (like Merlin disappearing) might happen if he said otherwise. "What did you say?"

"It might be suspicious," Merlin said slowly, like one did when speaking to a small and particularly stupid child, "if we were to appear now."

Arthur could see that. He could. Except - "No one will notice."

All five people standing near him stared. He shrugged, couldn't help but raise an eyebrow at them, feeling a thrill of belonging and deep seated contentment. "No one ever did, did they?"

"I don't think - " Merlin began to protest, but there was suddenly a knight galloping toward them and all of them stiffened - but the knight took little notice as he jerked his horse to a stop, pulling sharply on the poor beast's head.

Then as the horse panted the knight looked at him with wild eyes and it was Sir Lionel, one of the younger but scrawnier ones and with one of the faster horses. So it made sense he was used as a messenger but not what was so desperate about it all. "Sire - My prince. Your father is hurt."

Oh. Arthur blinked, slowly, wondering if this was the world's idea of balance, to get something back and have something else be taken away. His father should have stayed home - but a nest of gryphons, a small army of them had lured every fighter they had out in an attempt to defeat them and of course his father had come to defend his kingdom against invaders of the magical kind. Woodenly, he replied, "I will be right there. Let them know I am coming."

The knight wheeled his horse around. He could hear Mordred muttering suddenly, but it seemed unimportant as he stared mutely at Morgana whose eyes had gone wide, her face gone pale. Whatever problems she had with Uther, he could see in her eyes that this news shook her as well. Somehow, that didn't make him feel better, not even to see honest sadness on Merlin's face as he stepped away, leaving Arthur feeling bereft but also knowing this was a grief he could not share - even as Morgana ducked her head to hide it in Gwen's tunic, he knew he could not do the same.

"A horse," he said dazedly, looking around - and was surprised to find four coming toward him, none of them his. Except one did look faintly like the one he had given to Lancelot years ago, and another was definitely Morgana's. He looked in mute entreaty at Lancelot, whose horse was clearly the best for a fully armored knight.

"Take her, sire," Lancelot told him and gratefully, he did, freezing part way up and looking at the others. None of them had made a move toward their horses - but Gwen was still there. She would make sure they came, that they didn't disappear.

"I'll see you when you catch up," he said crisply, and it was a warning as well as a farewell. Morgana nodded tightly when he glanced at her, and Merlin said nothing at all. It would have to be enough.

The trees mocked him as he rode, and he did not know what he would find.

\----

A week back in Camelot, and Uther was slowly getting worse. Morgana stared out the window, remembering a day long ago when she had done the same and shivered. She was not that person - she refused to be that person again after being able to escape the trappings of a lady for so long. She had worn a dress today - only to see Uther, in a brief period of time that he was awake. She had torn it off almost before the door was closed in her room, refusing to wear it a second longer, her mouth curling at the way it moved around her, so soft and meant for nothing but the most delicate of work.

The dress lay on the floor where she had left it. Gwen had returned to being her servant in name at least, but Morgana was uncomfortably with it now. Just a year and she saw things so differently - she would settle back in. She knew she would, just as Merlin must and Mordred and Lancelot would.

She was getting new chambers. She had already decided that. They all were. With connecting doors, possibly. Or at least some of them. Perhaps Arthur and Merlin with a connecting door - and Mordred between her and Merlin, and a connecting door between her and Mordred and Mordred and Merlin. They could learn to lock doors when something untoward was happening. It would happen - she was used to getting her way now, and she was sure Arthur could be bullied into something he wanted anyway.

It was easier to think of the future than the present, with Uther dying. The future held the Camelot they wanted, that they hoped for. The present held the reason it couldn't exist dying and them all mourning him despite it all. Even Merlin looked so full of sorrow when he had every right to be terribly angry.

The door banged open suddenly and she glanced up, surprised but not showing it as Arthur barged in, pausing at seeing her back in tunic and trousers. He cocked his head, and made a clinical show of looking her up and down, looking distinctly unimpressed. "You were wearing a dress just this morning."

"Yes," she agreed and drove the point home, "And I only shall again in Uther's presence. Never after except for special occasions."

She watched his face twist, his mouth open - and then shut, looking at her with eyes too thoughtful, too knowing. He didn't deny it - nor did he give her the nod she craved. Instead, somehow rousing the tone needed for command he demanded, "Where is Merlin?"

She waved her hand automatically in the direction she could sense him, not even following the length of her hand with her sight. "In that direction. Somewhere. Already having problems?"

"That gives me nothing! And we can't have problems if he isn't talking to me," Arthur complained, looking put out and the tiniest bit uncertain. "He's barely talked to me this entire week."

"Perhaps he is giving you time to grieve alone," Morgana mused, but her curiosity was peaked. She had seen much of Merlin - as had Lancelot and Gwen and Mordred, she was sure. Avoiding Arthur hadn't been something she had expected - she crossed to the door with eager strides and bright eyes. "Go to your chambers, Arthur. I'll find him for you."

"I do not need your help," Arthur insisted, but she didn't bother to reply, striding onward. She ignored the odd looks as she had ignored them the entire week as the castle passed her by. Even the servants stopped to stare at the lady, the _woman_ who dared to not wear a dress. The castle passed in a blur, each step taking her closer to Merlin.

When her blood urged her up, she thought for an amusing moment Arthur had completely missed the obvious spot of the physician's quarters - but no, he hadn't. She went past them - up to the battlements where magic tingled through her senses. She drew a breath and nearly choked on it. Her hand shot out to catch her on the doorway as she swayed, surprised by the strength of it. This was not something she had expected - the tang of magic had been there, inside as well, but she had thought little of it, being so used to feeling it all around her. Their dwelling had been covered in it.

Now, so was the castle. It had felt so similar to home it wasn't until she saw Merlin, hands spread on the battlements that she realized. What had protected their home, where Arthur had not been, would only be a shadow in comparison to the strength Merlin would put in to protecting Camelot. She glided forward, feeling like she belonged here, on the battlements. She stopped by Merlin's side and studied his hands. "Blood magic."

"Binding magic," Merlin confirmed, too serious by far. "I pay attention, you know. To your dreams."

Blindly, she stared out, not seeing the town at all. "Yes. You would. Which one brought this on?"

"The ones of years coming," he said, quietly. "I know you only get glimpses - but there was more in what the druids wrote that confirmed them, added to them. Even without Mordred by their side, a power will rise."

"And Camelot could fall," she said, seeing it. The blood that would run through the streets haunted the few honest nightmares she had - brought on by a vague vision of the future. "You think this will prevent it?"

"It can't hurt," Merlin said, a note of brave cheer winding its way into his voice. Morgana watched him tremble, his eyes glowing gold as he started muttering a long stream of words. At the end, the wall seemed to ripple with gold. She was surprised that no one even looked up, didn't seem to notice at all. He sighed, and then slumped precariously forward, prompting her to grip his arm. He smiled weakly at her. "I had to do all four walls."

Eyes wide, she stared at the blood running into the battlements - but it was gone, part of the magic now and she quickly gripped one of his wrists. Turning it over, she could see the deep lines in his palm where he must have re-cut to keep the blood flowing. "Merlin - how long have you been up here?"

"Since before dawn," he said honestly, crooked smile doing nothing to assuage her worry. "I'm fine, really."

"Liar, she murmured, but let him lean on her anyway. She should take him to Gaius' chambers just below but - she didn't want to head down into the castle just yet. "Arthur is looking for you."

"Ah." Merlin winced, and it had nothing to do with the pain of his hands. "Is he?"

"You're avoiding him." She glanced at him and his expression was all the confirmation she needed. Idiot boys. "Why?"

Merlin sighed against her, his eyes growing dark and serious and she steeled herself against having to fight his stubborn nature. Usually, she could easily bully him, but when he dug his heels in... "We shouldn't... I was so happy to see him. But we can't, Morgana. Do what were almost did. He'll need heirs and a Queen and... it will kill me to have him and then _not_."

"You little fool." Morgana knew she should be calm but there was anger there, lashing out in the hiss of her voice. Idiotic, _blind_ boy. "You think Arthur _wants_ a queen? You think he will take a wife and just cast you aside?"

"I won't be the reason there are problems in a royal marriage," he snapped back and kept a firm grip on his arm as he struggled against her. She was glad that he was probably feeling a bit dizzy now. It made it easier to drive her point home.

"Then there won't be one," she snapped. "Gods, Merlin - you can think of so many other changes Arthur will make and be certain they'll come _why_ is this such a problem?"

"He is _king_," Merlin insisted, and she didn't correct him on his present tense. "He needs heirs."

"Why?" she said crossly. "There are other lines - maybe not other Pendragon lines, but it was through his mother the line came. Or he can choose a young knight as heir when he grows old - it isn't unheard of."

"I won't keep him from his future. He deserves children." Merlin sounded like his heart was breaking and she wanted to throw him off the battlements for a moment from pure aggravation.

She took a calming breath. "He deserves to be _happy_. So do you. So do we _all_."

"The nobles will - " Merlin started doubtfully.

"Then we'll replace them!" she interrupted. "It hasn't been so many generations that most of them came from nothing! Arthur doesn't _need_ them. He has the heart of the people, the knights, and _us_. If they try to rebel, it would take only a moments work to put a peasant in their place. The gods know _you_ are more educated than half the nobles."

"I'm a little bit of an odd peasant," Merlin pointed out, seemingly undisturbed by her indication they could just easily replace the nobles. "I didn't even know I wasn't supposed to be learning how to read."

"I'm sure we can find a few other oddities," she said firmly, "Or younger siblings or cousins who have less problems with changes. Arthur does not _need_ a Queen. And queen would be a farce - if politics made it essential, he'd be better off marrying one of _us_."

At Merlin's thoughtful look Morgana's look intensified into a glare. "Marrying one of us would also be _dishonest_. It would be a polite fiction everyone would see through. Do you really want to encourage that line of thinking, to put a lie forward to show everyone? Does _that_ fit your view of what Arthur wants?"

He drooped depressingly and she clung to him just to make sure he didn't tip forward unintentionally. "No. No it doesn't. And I wouldn't - I wouldn't want to take from Lancelot anyway."

Morgana snorted, her lips curling upward into a vicious smirk. "You would be taking from _me_. Gwen would be the one to do it if it happened - I won't ever be a pretty piece in court again."

"Yes." Merlin grinned at her, twisting to look her pointedly up and down. "I had noticed your lack of dress. Kind of a relief. Familiar."

"And you with your cloak." She nodded at the brown cloak he still wore and wondered if he even took it off inside. "Even if I can't be a knight, I refuse to be helpless, or even pretend to be."

"Why can't you be a knight?" Merlin argued. "If a peasant, why not a woman? They all know you fight better than half of them anyway."

She studied him a moment, strangely amused. "Arthur must have a wife but women can be knights? Merlin, you are a strange one even now. Which do you think would bother the nobles more?"

He shook his head and straightened, scowling at her. "It's different."

"No," she said, and decided it then and there, seeing the blood drying on his fingers. "It's not. But I don't truly want to be a knight - it is different only in that sense. We cannot change people's minds through magic, Merlin. That does not mean we should give up our happiness because of what they may think." She touched her fingers to his lips as he opened his mouth to further debate the subject. "Go see Arthur. Now. He deserves to at least be told that you're making decisions for the both of you."

He flinched as if struck, and she was glad to see some of the determination had worn away into uncertainty. Morgana watched him go, feeling satisfied. She had rusted the armor he had on, and Arthur would slash through it. After that, they could make true plans for what they could and couldn't do. There were many ways to pass on a kingdom. Arthur did not need to follow in his father's footsteps.

\----

Sometimes, Arthur wanted nothing more than to fall into his bed and bury himself in it, pretend that he was a child again and not Prince, acting King, and with a duty to his kingdom and a dying father. He leaned at his window, staring out at his castle, his courtyard. Gaius had confirmed there was nothing to be done for the King but a slow, drugged death. He was tempted to ask "Even magic?" but was afraid. Gaius had made it clear to all and sundry that the King was dying. If he even asked, and Merlin heard... he might try. Probably _had_. Which meant there was nothing to be done. But he might try harder if Arthur asked.

So he didn't. It helped that Merlin was nowhere to be found and Morgana, much like Mordred and Lancelot, seemed to have an unerring sense of direction as to where he was. All the time.

He didn't have that. Arthur wanted it. Instead he supposed once Merlin showed his face - supposing Morgana actually found him and they weren't all playing with him (Lancelot wouldn't, but the other two...) - he would have to get on that plan of tying him to Arthur's bed. It would be highly enjoyable for both of them.

The door opened without anyone knocking and he immediately turned, a satisfied smile on his face. There was only one person who ever had entered without at least one knock - even if Morgana never had waited for his answer. "Merlin, what have you been doing? I do realize you've been gone awhile, but it is still your job to tend to me."

Merlin's smile was a small, fake thing as he tried for a normal voice and failed when he said, "Of course, sire."

Arthur's eyes narrowed swiftly, understanding the distance that was being attempted between them. He just didn't know why. "What's wrong with you, Merlin?"

He didn't bother to actually listen, noticing something odd about Merlin's hands concealed in the cloak as Merlin began, "Nothing's wrong, everything is fine, si - " He cut Merlin off by striding over, yanking one hand up to eye level. "Oh. Well. There is that."

His gifted Merlin with a scathing look before studying the bandaged hand with an experienced and mildly amazed eye. "Dear gods Merlin, this may be the worst job I've ever seen someone do on bandages. Don't tell me _you_ did this?"

Merlin's disgruntled expression said yes, yes he _had_ done it and Arthur jerked him closer (to look at the wound of course, the way Merlin half fell against him was just a nice benefit) and scowled at the bandaged hand. "Were you blind at the time?"

"It's a bit hard to do when they're _both_ like that," Merlin grumbled, reluctantly holding up his _other_ hand for inspection. It was equally as bandaged, except by the blood on it, that hand had been done first.

Arthur pressed his fingers into Merlin's first hand, trying to find where the wound actually was. Merlin sucked in a partially stifled breath of air as he pressed near the center and he gritted his teeth. "What happened?"

There was no room for argument there. Arthur added a serious glare to it when it looked like Merlin might try anyway. He folded grudgingly under the combined weight of the command and Arthur's stare. "I cut them. To do some magic with."

"Magic that needed you to bleed," he said flatly, tightening his grip before Merlin's pained grimace reminded him of where his hand was. He shifted his hand back to holding Merlin's wrist, studying the other man. "Why?"

"I wanted to protect Camelot," Merlin answered, too soft and serious to really be Merlin as he ducked his head, peering at Arthur through his eye lashes in a way that he had seen few times. Usually followed by Merlin trying to get himself killed or seriously telling Arthur he was a great king (and then going to get himself _killed_) but always, always they were about protecting _Arthur_ and had little to do with Camelot.

"_Merlin_," he groaned, and couldn't find the words to say _"I don't want you bleeding for me, dying for me, hurt for me"_ and instead crushed his mouth to Merlin's, the initial rough embrace gentling quickly as Arthur controlled himself, remembered patience and that time was now, finally, on his side. Coaxing Merlin into open his mouth was easy, he opened willing, gave himself willingly.

Arthur had them half way to the bed and Merlin's cloak was dropping to the floor when Merlin suddenly pushed him back, eyes flying opened and looked wild eyed and uncertain as he said with a wobbling, hoarse voice, "We can't."

Arthur frowned. That wasn't how this was supposed to go. "Yes, we really can."

"No," Merlin said more firmly and Arthur heart sunk and shattered. The dreams never played out this scenario. "It would be wrong."

"Wrong?" Arthur asked, incredulous and wondering just who Merlin had been with the past two years to incite those kind of thoughts. Lancelot was likely at fault - the gods knew Morgana was as shameless as they came. "I'm going to be king. This can't be wrong."

"I won't cause problems in your marriage!" Merlin exclaimed, fisting his hands at his side as his voice rose.

"That's good," Arthur said slowly. "Since I'm not getting married."

For a moment, Merlin looked terribly lost and Arthur took the time to place his hands back where they belonged, one scraping through Merlin's hair, the other at his hip, holding him close. "Don't be an idiot, Merlin. Why would I get married to some woman?"

For a moment, the other man looked adrift, as if he could no longer remember either and Arthur felt his heart begin to knit together as he slowly realized the problem wasn't _him_, the problem was, for once, it wasn't_Arthur_ thinking of his duty. Merlin rallied himself, much to Arthur's disappointment. "Heirs. You'll need... babies. And the nobles will want an alliance."

"I will tell the nobles I am making a much better alliance," Arthur said, grinning slyly. "After all, a powerful sorcerer is a much better dowry than anyone could hope for. It's for the good of the kingdom really. You might get frustrated and destroy something in a snit otherwise."

"I have never destroyed anything in a snit," Merlin said feebly and Arthur promised himself to pick at Merlin later for _that_ story because he certainly had. He still couldn't lie well.

"As for heirs," Arthur continued blithely, "there are many ways around that. Perhaps Morgana will have a child - she's related by our mothers."

"Is she?" Merlin asked, looking like he might be on the way to being convinced. He swallowed. "It's your duty - "

"To take care of my people," Arthur interrupted seriously. "Not to give up my own happiness or yours so that the nobles will be happy. Camelot will be better off with _you_ at my side _and_ in my bed than any woman. Nobles are terribly replaceable - my father taught them that during the Purges and I will reeducate them if needed. I _am not_ getting married."

Merlin flailed half heartedly, gesturing between them. "We don't even know if this will work out. You shouldn't say that."

That protest was the worst of them and Arthur's lips curled up smugly. "Of course it will. You have been protecting me for _years_, laying down your life and mooning after me from afar." He waited a beat and spoke just as Merlin understood and the offended look bloomed. "And _I_ am _never_ letting anyone else touch you. I can be as loyal as you are, and I do not let go of things that are _mine_. There is nothing to work out - there is just us."

"And we've always been so easy," Merlin remarked dryly.

Arthur gave him a filthy leer. "Actually, right now I'm quite hard."

He punctuated that remark with a thrust of his hips and any further arguments were delayed (hopefully forever) for much more enjoyable activities.

\----

Two weeks after Uther died and Camelot still did not seem to know if it should be mourning or celebrating. The official coronation celebration was another two weeks away, nobles and servants alike scrambling to get things ready. Morgana watched the courtyard, highly amused by the presents rolling in that day. There were wonderful rugs from Dyfed, and some of the wine they were famous for. It would be a surprise to all but a few in two weeks when Arthur's first proclamation after being crowned would be the dissolution on the ban of magic - and she, Merlin, and Mordred would be there to stop any of the protestors getting too excited.

Lancelot shifted by her side and she smiled over at him, and at Gwen on his other side. In public, Gwen sometimes slid her hand over Lancelot's - for now, that was something Morgana dared not do. They were still fighting, choosing what they could push and what they couldn't. As nobles, she and Arthur were used to having to hide parts of their lives... but it still ached that they might not be able to publicly acknowledge those important to them. Certainly she and Gwen and Lancelot hadn't gotten to the point Arthur and Merlin were at quite yet - but they would.

Perhaps then they could find time to explain the connection between the four of them that so far left Arthur and Gwen out... and then they could bring them into it. She leaned slightly closer to Lancelot, not daring to put her head on his shoulder but aching to do it, and to pull Gwen closer.

She had a hand out, ready to touch or do something similarly inappropriate that would make people stare in disapproval when Arthur marched up to them, Mordred trailing after him, and announced, "Merlin is nowhere to be found."

Irritated, she arched a brow up at him and glanced to Merlin and Arthur and back again. "Why is this my problem?"

"He won't tell me where he is," Arthur growled, eyes sparking with anger, fire behind his eyes. Morgana felt a cold curl of worry in her belly and she glanced at Mordred in concern.

What she received back was not at all what she expected, his hands clenched behind his back and his mind-voice carefully even. _'I cannot sense Emrys. I do not know why.'_

She stared for a moment, wondering what he meant - because Merlin was a buzz in the back of her mind, she could sense him clearly. Mordred wasn't lying - it was much harder to lie mind-to-mind, and she kept herself calm, not wanting to let herself think about _trust_ and _Mordred_ and why Merlin would block himself from the youth that had once been Arthur's doom. Carefully, not evening knowing what she wanted the answer to be, she asked, "Lancelot? Can you sense Merlin?"

The man paused as she looked at him, his mouth opening for the automatic response - and then closing, his eyes wide and stunned. "No. I can't."

Some tension bled out of Merlin and seemed to go into Arthur. Before he could work himself up or send knights on patrols she said, "I can. I don't think - there's no reason for him to deliberately block them and not me. Follow.

She was off without another word, trying not to contemplate if Merlin _had_ been specifically blocking the other two. He might be angry with her if he had been, but he had said nothing - in fact the last conversation they'd had he had made vague allusions to one of the top floors of the castle, a blocked off wing. As they had all been drunk with some early opened ale (it was for Arthur, why should they not use it early?) she couldn't be quite sure of last night's memories.

Yet he was up, and to the east. She knew, suddenly, what wing he had been talking about, where he was, and she stopped halfway up the stairs, blinking upward. "Oh," she said in realization, softly muttered to the wall. She looked back at Arthur and wondered if he even knew.

He looked back, any worry or concern masked under glaring impatience. "Stop dawdling, Morgana."

She narrowed her eyes, but the concern she felt would not be waylaid by annoyance, not this time. "He's in the east wing above. It used to be the royal wing."

Even Mordred straightened up at that, understanding from whatever she and Merlin had let drop that Uther's wife, Queen Igraine, had lived in that wing, on that floor, and that Uther had gone mad with grief. Blinded to anything but the bad in magic. The stories were confusing - she had died because of magic, and on the night of Arthur's birth. That was all that was clear, all that had ever been clear and she had never stopped to wonder before what that might mean.

"Go on," Arthur prompted, looking so unconcerned it _had_ to be faked. "Let's see what our favorite warlock has gotten himself into this time."

Watching him carefully, she saw no hesitation, not even a twitch - only annoyance and an edge of anger as she continued to stand there. Before anything could come of it, she turned without warning and went up the stairs, her steps fast and light as the door approached closer and closer. It wasn't sealed like it should have been, locked and boarded up. The boards sat to one side, the door stood wide open. The door ill-fit the entry way, like it had been forced onto it. It was likely, Morgana thought, that once the doorway had no door, just like every other archway of the castle that didn't contain a room.

Stepping through it, she found herself in a long hallway, with even a few branches off of it. She took a few steps forward and something buzzed through her mind. The others slipped by her, their words meaning nothing and seeming to slide off of her, as did their eyes. Until Mordred stepped through and cried out, stumbling back and almost falling down the deadly stairs. Arthur snatched him back, arm coming around the boy to clutch him close as Mordred's knees gave out, still crying out and hands scrabbling at his head. "The dead - their thoughts - "

"They left their magic here," Morgana said, feeling it now. "A more immortal memory than even Uther could get rid of. There were many here. I think - I think the wing was filled with them. Sorcerers. I don't understand."

The last she uttered softly, her brow creasing as she tried to see the past instead of the future for once but her eyes refused to turn there, only catching brief feelings and knowledge before it was gone, leaving her bereft and Mordred shaking, trembling in Arthur's arms but denying the encouragement toward the stairs. "No, it's gone now - it was... a warning. To any of their kind that came. I could hear them, but they had so little time and were half mad with fear... it didn't work so well. I could feel their screams as they died. He... he and the knights there..."

"Don't," Gwen said, her lips trembling as she stepped forward, hugging the boy to her, tugging him from Arthur's arms. "We get it. You don't need to say it."

"Merlin is up here?" Arthur asked, looking vaguely sickened. "Can't he feel - "

"Yes, he is. I can still feel him," Morgana said, her eyes twisting to the rooms about them. "We should - search."

She hadn't meant to say that. She had meant they should follow again - she knew exactly where he was. But something else in her hissed at her to be silent - something important was here. As they started searching the rooms she walked past, all of them engrossed in looking at the rooms that were so different, held so much history. Or maybe the magic made them look away.

The door loomed in front of her after two turns of the hall and she knew what it was. The dragon tapestry stood across from it, and the door itself seemed special, the room inside larger. It opened with a push of her hand, not even entirely closed. She looked blankly at the bed inside, its sheets clean and white even though they must have been blood splattered the last time someone slept there - but, no, he hadn't been born here. She had been so weak - they had taken her elsewhere.

Then Uther had come back, and slaughtered the sorcerers that had lived in the wing. Except Morgana didn't know why. Hand still on the door, she shifted and her gaze caught on a connecting door. It was afar, and she could make out books and books, a miniature library of its own... a library nearly as large as their actual one. Amazed, she found herself stepping inside - and the door squeaked open to show Merlin, pale faced and wide-eyed, gaze glued to the book in front of him. "Merlin?"

"Morgana," he said dully. "Did you know?"

"Know what?" she asked, stepping closer, concerned and a little fearful by the absence of any _life_ in Merlin's gaze. "What should I know?"

"Nimueh was Court Sorcerer." Merlin said flatly and it was so absurd, Morgana wanted to laugh - but Merlin didn't give her the chance, continuing in that same horrible tone devoid of anything. "Queen Igraine couldn't produce an heir. Or maybe it was Uther - who knows. Uther had to have an heir, and Igraine was not as opposed to magic - she and Nimueh were friends. In fact, Nimueh was apparently the godmother of Igraine, her twin Morgause, and her younger sister Viviane."

"Was she?" Morgana asked, cautiously slipping into the chair across from him and no longer paying attention to the shelves of books lining the walls, surrounding them on every side. "What does - Nimueh have to do with Igraine? Did she curse her?"

Merlin barked a short hard laugh, then pressed a horrified hand to his mouth, looking at her with sad eyes. He slowly dropped his hand back to the book. "She was also priestess of the Isle of the Blessed, you know. She popped back to it when someone came as a supplicant... Igraine knew her power. Had told Uther. And when Uther went to magic for what medicine had failed to give him - neither woman objected."

The bottom dropped out of her stomach, her heart pounding in a sickening manner. "No. They didn't - There's a balance. They had to know."

"Here." He thrust the book at her - which was, she now knew, some kind of journal. With trembling fingers she opened it.

_"My name is Nimueh. My father is unknown, my mother long dead. Today, I have am no longer just Priestess to the Isle of the Blessed, but Court Sorcerer of Camelot, where prophecy says the Once and Future King will be born within a century's time - from the Pendragon line. I am confident that I can help this come to pass and protect the family. Uther distrusts magic, but I can make him laugh and I have found a friend in the King. For once there is someone who has a power nearly as absolute as my own. It is a pleasure to see Igraine grown into womanhood. I feel I have come home."_

Morgana paused, swallowed, and flipped through the pages, scanning. Nimueh had been a vibrant, strong woman, confident in her own power and ambitions. She knew she could have anything she wanted if she just tried hard enough, and magic could solve nearly all of her problems. The pages described a Camelot where her magic was common place, her chambers cleaning themselves (no maid would come near her, which Morgana felt Nimueh had probably been hurt at, but never admitted) and the land green and healthy.

What made her tremble was the affection in the words for Igraine - and Morgause, her twin. Morgana's mother. She had visited her often, and had mused there must be magic in the blood to have one sister blond as wheat and the other dark as night, but both with the same sweet and slightly wicked personality - though Igraine, surprisingly, had been the one more wicked and up for pranks as a child while Morgana's own mother had grown to be more staid.

Viviane was mentioned little, except that she was a quiet, thoughtful child of nearly a decade of difference with her older sisters.

The tone grew more serious as the dates shifted, Nimueh worried about Igraine, who wanted a child so badly, and Uther, who needed a heir to establish his line successfully. Igraine, as the older sister and first married, had been given away as bride to the man she loved and her father approved of. Respect had been won in battle, kingship in bed. It would be sealed with a child - and then Morgause married, and things became more... desperate.

_"If Morgause has an heir first - and the gods know she and her husband are so sweet in love they can't even see, so it shan't be long - it could cause problems for the kingdom. Uther has proposed to be today... I should not contemplate it. There is always a price for these things... but I am Priestess. I am powerful. I am more powerful than any that has come before me. I will do this for them. They are willing to pay the price - I will make the balance accept a life of lesser power for once, of lesser emotion. Uther and Igraine will love there son only as much as they do each other - there is no emotional connection that would be as great. As for the child... I have a sense there is no magical power besides myself that would do as a sacrifice, and I will not ask my brothers and sisters to lay down their lives for him. No - perhaps many lives can do. A slew of bandits, a cell full of murderers._

Not them. I will turn the old magic away. I will give them their heir, the king the land is waiting for.

I shall give them a son."

"No, they _couldn't_ have," Morgana breathed but knew it was true all the same. She looked up to find Merlin had another journal in his hands and was looking at her, swallowing slowly. There was something in his eyes that was asking a question, and before he could utter it she quickly looked down, flipping pages.

_"I did not mean to. I tried to turn the magic away. He did not believe me. He has... I can feel them. Each of their deaths, I can feel them just as I felt hers. Oh, gods - is this what the price is for the king we wait for? Not just of mother, of emotional balance, but of power? He has slaughtered them, the sorcerers of the court. I fled to Morgause - but she turned me away, her hand on her burgeoning belly and I understand. Safety - they could not be safe if I was here._

Instead I have found myself traveling with a woman escaping Camelot in the midst of the purges. She is not magic herself - not truly. She knows a few charms and that would perhaps be enough for Uther to condemn her. But she is pregnant and worried. I can feel the child's life, despite being only a month in her belly. I don't even know how she knows.

If I had to guess, I would say the babe was conceived the same night the prince was born."

Morgana paused, looking up at Merlin, wondering if perhaps that was all there was, the beginning of Nimueh's descent into terror and madness. "Now she's talking about after - how much did you read?"

"I didn't skim like you're doing," Merlin said vaguely. "I read up to about there - then it was... I skipped past it. I didn't... need to read the rest of that one. She talks about Viviane - you and Arthur's aunt I suppose - in this one a little. And Tristan, their half-brother from the wrong side of the sheets. There's... connections in everything. I think the old magic sort of... guided her places, even then."

Morgana nodded, something in her mind clicking. Guiding her - then maybe the woman was important. She skipped a few more pages, disappointed as Nimueh left the woman in a small village just outside Camelot's borders called - She paused, read it again, looked back at Merlin and then down quickly before he looked up. She skimmed the pages quickly, watching the dates. Arthur had been born - then nine months later... No, barely _eight_, no wonder Merlin was scrawny even as a grown man.

_"I don't know why I was drawn here, to help in this birthing. Despite it being early, it was easy. I did not even need to use magic. The child was a boy, and there is nothing odd about him as far as I can tell. Yet, the old magic seems... pleased. And I do feel like he is kin in some way. Perhaps it is one bastard to another. We are both fatherless - which is better than little Arthur and Morgana. It seems both twins were bound to die birthing their children."_

"...There is a knot hanging in the window. I have been here three days and I have just noticed it. Hunith has been giving me worried glances for days, after I thought I saw her fall with the babe in her hands, thought I saw him crashing to the floor - then nothing, as if time had skipped. Now I see the knot and wonder.

My mother had that same knot. Intricate and somehow made with love, feathers woven in and smelling of summer. I checked. It smells exactly the same way - except fresher.

Summer is not for another month. The nights are still chilled.

I must leave this place. I cannot stay here. Uther kills my kind and if not for a promise made to see the young Prince safely to adulthood... I will go back to the Island and make plans. These thoughts are pointless. I leave them behind. And this."

As Morgana flipped the page, a knot fell out, exactly as described. She lifted it out and held it to the light. There was nothing really magical about it, nothing she could sense - but she brought it to her face and it smelled like summer. "Merlin," she said slowly. "I think you need to read the last bit of this journal."

"Yeah?" Merlin said, sounding distracted. "You need to read this one. Mordred is your cousin - and Arthur's. And he... the knot she describes your aunt having is a bit like - "

"This?" she suggested and he looked up. His eyes caught on it and widened to slim blue rings. "Nimueh's mother had one. I imagine this was hers."

Merlin stared at it, the silence stretching - and then abruptly he stood, beginning to pace. "This can't be true. She wouldn't - Nimueh wouldn't have come back here and left things."

"Why not?" Morgana challenged. "Where safer once she knew it had been sealed off? She and Igraine probably spent days in here when she was alive."

"_Morgana_," Merlin said desperately. "How could my mother and Nimueh's have the same knot? My mother - she said it was from my father. All she would ever say. And Mordred's mother - it's not possible. The years alone - "

"The same likelihood that Mordred is the son of my aunt who disappeared fourteen years ago I suspect," Morgana said with false cheer. "Did Nimueh orchestrate that birth too?"

"No," Merlin croaked. "She was just there for it. She - helped birth him. She could hear his cries in her head. She even wrote - she knew he could be Arthur's downfall and by then, she welcomed it. She handed him to the druids and gave him his name. She _named_ him."

"Not her, not really," Morgana murmured. "The old magic. It used her... shared blood to him and to you. I imagine she was supposed to take you away and give you to the druids or raise you herself."

"Shared blood," Merlin said, and shook his head. "No. No, I won't - I _killed her_. She could not have - I didn't kill my..."

_Sister_, hung in the air and Morgana knew there really wasn't a way to tell, and he was right, no human, mortal man could have fathered all three of them... but Nimueh had vivid blue eyes and dark hair. So did Morgana herself and perhaps Viviane, it wasn't necessarily a family trait but - Mordred, Merlin, and Nimueh all were special. Powerful. Morgana had power, she was a Seer - but not like that.

"Nimueh was my mother's godmother," she said, pieces falling into place. "Gods, Merlin - who told her to do that? Someone must have. Even the pull of destiny can't be that strong. _We_ fought it."

She realized what he was thinking as he stiffened, his eyes burning with anger. It wasn't hard - he had talked, anger warring with guilt and uncertainty, about the lies, about the dragon pushing and manipulating him where it wanted. Not, perhaps as well as the druids had been with Mordred, due to their own visions, but - she felt slightly appalled at her own kind and the efforts seers and prophets went to, arranging things to their liking.

But then - was she any better?

"Don't jump to any conclusions," she warned as his eyes sparked gold, things in the room trembling. "We should - get to the others. Out of this room."

"Yeah, who knows what we'll find in the _other_ books," Merlin said bitterly. She glanced around at the high shelves and shuddered. There could be other journals - and if one was Igraine's instead of Nimueh's, she didn't want to see any more. Perhaps Arthur would, but not her - she had learned enough she needed to forget.

She stood slowly and pushed the journal away from herself. If she just stepped out of the room and had some time to breathe she was sure it would all make sense - and not be the conclusions she was coming to in her head.

Merlin wasn't quite as ready to leave them as that, it seemed. He snatched both journals up as he followed her out of the room. She stared, puzzled at the outer door of the chambers. She didn't remember closing it - and certainly not locking it. There was a heavy pounding on the door that should have been impossible to miss from inside the connected library. Yet even now it seemed muffled while the door shook with the blows being pounded upon it. She looked at Merlin, whose eyes still glittered gold on the edge of using magic. "Did you do this?"

"No," was all he said and the gold flared heavy in his eyes before fading to blue as the door crashed open. "But I did that."

Four frightened faces looked at them from where the door had thundered open and Morgana winced as Merlin held a hand to his head, Mordred's frightened voice babbling nonsense into their minds. She couldn't catch more than a few words of it and it was Merlin who said a bit desperately, "Mordred, _please_. I can't even think."

"You don't do that normally," Arthur muttered, but it was half-hearted at best as he studied them, eyes sweeping over their pale, ashen faces. "Why couldn't we get into the room?"

"I'm not sure," Morgana said, trying to put the best explanation forward even while Mordred's mental voice abruptly cut off. "If I had to guess - if Mordred had been alone he would have been let in. He has magic and... the necessary blood connections."

"Blood connections?" Mordred asked, brow crinkling as he stared at them. "I never knew my parents."

"Nimueh did," Merlin said, his voice flat and hands clenched around the journals. "But she apparently knew _everyone's_ parents so I guess that makes sense."

Morgana cast Merlin a concerned look, but couldn't imagine the turmoil his mind was in. She after all, had perhaps gained a cousin. He had learned he had likely killed his sister, gained a brother, and learned his lover was only alive because Nimueh had been arrogant enough to believe she could bend the old ways to her will. She reached out a hand toward him, containing a flinch when he shied away. "Merlin - "

He shook his head rapidly, not looking at her or anyone - just clutching those journals to his chest. She swallowed her objection and nodded once, jerkily, to indicate she understood before looking into Arthur's eyes. "We should... discuss this elsewhere."

Arthur made an effort to break contact with her to look around the room, finally recognizing what it was. He nodded shortly and backed from the room - waiting by the entrance as the others streamed by. She walked by and turned her head to see his face crease with worry as he reached for Merlin. She held her breath but despite tensing up at the touch, Merlin leaned toward Arthur, letting him draw him closer.

She faced front, looking away as their lips met in a silent comfort.

\----

Merlin hadn't spoken the entire time. The journals had been passed around and yes, Arthur was horrified and shocked and all that - but Merlin hadn't spoken, not since they left that empty dead place near the top of the castle that caught the morning sun every day for the past two decades and more, empty of anything living except one crazy sorceress who apparently randomly popped in and added spells and journals and led them down a path of madness.

Except it wasn't. A path of madness. He wasn't even sure _what_ to think about the circumstances of his birth - he had always regretted, deep inside, that he had never met his mother. Now he knew he never could have - for him to live, she had to die and the price for his birth was paid in the blood of magic.

All of them sat in Arthur's chambers - he hadn't yet been moved to the King's chambers and for that he was glad. It was more comfortably, to watch as Mordred finished reading and Gwen, in the corner, talked quietly with Lancelot and Morgana, sending anxious looks at Merlin.

He leaned back in his chair and watched Merlin stare out the window blindly. His eyes had always been blue except when he was using magic - but there was no magic that Arthur could see, yet Merlin's eyes were simmering on the edge of gold, not quite the bright burn of a spell but as if on the edge of one, the magic rolling and demanding beneath his skin. It shivered through the air.

Once, Arthur had thought Morgana needed grounding to the earth sometimes. When the worst of her dreams - her visions, he knew now - were on her, she had seemed half-mad with them, wild-eyed. Even at her best before leaving Camelot there had always been something haunted in her eyes. Now, for the first time, he was wondering if it was _Merlin_ who needed grounding.

Mordred closed the journal slowly and Merlin's gaze flew to him. It was the second journal, a dark red cover that looked out of place in Mordred's pale hands. Arthur itched to take it from him. There had been so much more than just Mordred's birth in there - records of horrors Nimueh had committed, and that Uther had committed that she had known about. Ravings of the power of the island, of waiting.

Mordred folded his hands over the journal and looked at Merlin, then at the knot in the middle of the table. "I had one of those, too."

Merlin still didn't say anything, the gold fading from his eyes as he watched Mordred and looked uncertain, hesitant - as if now he just didn't know how to respond. Mordred had no such problems. "It could be worse. At least she didn't keep us."

"The old religion wanted her too," Morgana said slowly. "I think it's part of what fueled her hate. It was angry that she wouldn't listen."

Merlin frowned, looking at her. "How do you know?"

"I just do," Morgana said simply, leaving it at that. Arthur wanted more than that as well, but he wasn't going to push.

"Is there any way to confirm any of this?" Arthur asked, watching the three sorcerers in the room. "Some magic you can do?"

"Maybe," Merlin answered distantly. "I've never heard of such a spell."

"Neither have I," Mordred added, which was more of a surprise. Merlin had only had his book and six months with the druids for magical experience outside himself. Mordred had lived with the druids all his life and had the ear for gossip on magic.

Gwen cleared her throat loudly and hesitated as they all looked at her. Arthur tried to look encouraging and not slide his gaze back to Merlin who was still too quiet and still. "Um... What about Gaius? At least for... the first journal? He could probably confirm that much and if _that_ is all true then..."

"Good idea, Gwen," Arthur said approvingly, and stood. He glanced around the room and saw Mordred shifting as if to get up. The boy had become the automatic messenger of the group, being the youngest and the least likely of them to be stared at for running about as no one really knew him. Arthur waved him down and leaned out into the hall, unsurprised to see a servant hovering nearby he could give orders to.

As the girl ran off to get Gaius he turned back into the room and studied them. Not for the first time, he felt a prickling of hastily suppressed jealousy by the way Lancelot, Mordred, and Morgana seemed to speak to each other with just looks and anxious glances at Merlin. Then Lancelot turned earnest pleading eyes on him and he straightened in surprise as the knight's eyes flicked to Merlin and then him again, asking _him_ to do something.

He inclined his head in response, indicating his acknowledgement, and slipped closer to where Merlin had gone back to staring out the window. His hand on Merlin's shoulder caused the warlock to start and something crashed to the ground behind them as Merlin's eyes flared into gold. Arthur didn't even look. "Do I have to order you to talk about it?"

"I don't follow orders well," Merlin replied, his voice hollow. "Nimueh said it all."

"Not every day you find out you have a sister," Arthur said, forcing his voice to sound cheery and gently squeezing Merlin's shoulder as he tensed. "Or a brother."

"Or that you killed your sister," Merlin said harshly and the magic was almost solid for a moment. Arthur didn't know how he had never noticed it before, the sharp taste of it, the heavy and heady power that thrummed in Merlin's veins. Even since coming back he had never noticed _this_, the power laying in the air, _on_ them.

"Do you regret it?" he asked carefully, and held back his own emotions as he waited for an answer.

"No," Merlin answered with a heavy sigh. Something in Arthur's chest eased and Merlin's expression loosened into a ghost of a smile. "Not any of it. Don't be a fool."

"I'll leave that to you," he said lightly, and didn't care that the other four were in the room as he leaned forward, just a light brush of his lips. He was smirking smugly when he leaned back because Merlin had given a sigh that sounded like he was about to swoon at the touch of Arthur's lips. "You great girl."

"I'm going to turn you into a frog," Merlin muttered, leaning his forehead against Arthur's. "It will be the ugliest and fattest frog the world has ever seen."

Arthur scoffed and wound his other arm around Merlin. "Don't lie. You know any animal I am will be the most gorgeous of its kind."

Everything wasn't all right - but Merlin was looking at him, with his eyes blue and not burning at the edge of gold which was all he could really ask for. He trailed the hand on Merlin's shoulder down to his wrist, meaning to lace their hands together because he too was apparently turning into a pansy, but he stopped thoughtfully, running his fingers across Merlin's hand and the diagonal scar there. "Where did this come from?"

Merlin jerked back an inch as if surprised and then looked confusedly about, eyes going to Mordred, then Morgana, and then, unsurprisingly, Lancelot. "Did no one tell you?"

"I thought we were waiting." Morgana sounded vaguely embarrassed.

"It'll do as a distraction," Lancelot said, eyes flicking to the door. "While we wait."

"Does this have to do with why the four of you always know where each other are?" Gwen piped up, looking at them with wide, curious eyes. "I had wondered."

"As had I," Arthur murmured to Merlin, pulling him gently to a chair before Arthur himself went to sit, turning his chair so he could spot everyone standing and sitting around the room. "So. Explain."

The four of them glanced t each other, their expressions meaning nothing to Arthur until Lancelot and Mordred shrugged and Merlin waved at Morgana. "I think you should start - I can pick up at the spell."

Morgana straightened up where she sat on one of his many chests and looked thoughtfully down at her hands, her fingers running along a scar on one palm that Arthur suddenly felt sure matched Merlin's. "My visions were slowly getting worse. I was seeing farther, but they hit hard, and sometimes there would be so many of them they would jumble up. I would see and hear echoes of things in my visions, and answer questions before people had asked. Not always. But sometimes there would be whole days or weeks I was like that. I couldn't live with that."

"So I found a spell," Merlin said quietly. "It was hard - and it was more a _rumor_ of a spell than anything. But there have been Seers before that had this problem, when their abilities were too strong and went untrained for too long. So we... grounded her. With magic. Blood magic. We bound ourselves to each other."

"It required so many things," Mordred continued quietly into the pause as Arthur stared at Merlin, hands tight on the arm of his chair. "Otherwise the magic wouldn't have worked. Trust - trust to keep each other safe. And to share our lives... that we were willing to spend the rest of our lives near each other."

"It was a test of the truest friendship," Lancelot said, lifting his head proudly. "An honor to be allowed to be part of the protection. It was a sharing of what we are."

"And it worked," Morgana said, sounding so grateful Arthur felt guilty for his flaring jealousy - the same jealousy he could see in Gwen's down turned eyes. "Even if it did more than we expected. It was... I'm not sure how to explain how it changed, but it was like there was a buffer between me and the dreams, something that kept me in the present. Later, we found other spells to help keep my visions clear."

"So you're, what, _married_ to each other?" There was a dangerous edge to Arthur's voice and he didn't look at Merlin, just glared at Morgana and Lancelot. "Magically married."

"_No_," Four voices said at once, shudders through Merlin's voice as he added, "Arthur, _Mordred_ is a part of this. It's not _marriage_ more like - like - "

"Family," Mordred said, ducking his head to look up out of shy eyes. "Like I had a family."

"Trust," Morgana added, smiling at Lancelot especially. "We had it already - but now there could be no doubts that if I needed something, I could ask it. Anything of them."

"A purpose," Lancelot said, his smile shy. "I - They needed someone who wasn't magical to take care of them, sire."

"He's right," Merlin said, and he was flushing when Arthur slowly looked over. "We ah, got caught up a lot before Lancelot joined us. We worried him sick once before the bond when we wouldn't wake up and he didn't know if he should or not."

"Now I always will know," Lancelot said and - somehow it was just as bad as if they were lovers (as improbable as he would have realized that to be if he had been thinking) because he would never have that.

"I wish you had waited for this." Morgana was disgruntled, crossing her arms. "We can't possibly add you two to the bond right now. It will be another month before some of the plants for it are even grown."

"No it won't," Merlin said as Arthur stared at her, stunned. "I still have enough dried ones. I, um, may have made enough for them back then. Just in case."

Arthur, mutely, had to stare at him now and Merlin quickly added, "It's not that I was _assuming_ you or Gwen would want to be a part of it. But I thought - I mean, if you _wanted_ to, the option would be there."

"You can really just - add me in?" Gwen asked, shyly eager. "It won't - disrupt anything?"

"You've always been ours," Morgana said, quite calm as she smiled in pure possession at Gwen. "Even if Merlin refuses to put it in those terms, its true. It wouldn't hurt a thing - better yet we would be whole."

"All the requirements are there. We trust you," Mordred said frankly, surprising Arthur because he had found himself liking the child and could see his worth and already had let him in where few others could be - but he hadn't expected that the boy felt the same way. Mordred grinned at him, as if sensing his thoughts. "There's another benefit as well. I can only talk to those magical usually - but I can talk to Lancelot sometimes too with this."

"Useful," Arthur mused, and the amused expression on the boy's face said he wasn't terribly surprised. He glanced over at Merlin, who was watching him with an uncertain trepidation that made Arthur roll his eyes. "Stop looking at me like I'm going to break your heart you idiot sorcerer. Of course I'll be joining this. I have to make sure you four aren't abusing what could be an important advantage."

Merlin slumped in relief, flashing him a grin. "I'm sure that's what you're worried about."

Arthur puffed up his chest, ready for another reply - and then a knock came on the door and all laughter died as Gaius called, "Sire? You asked for me?"

Sobering quickly, Arthur glanced at the others and straightened in his chair. It was time to know the truth. "Come in."

The door opened, and Gaius walked in. His eyes fell on the earlier journal, green in color, and his face paled. Arthur grew cold, his face expressionless and knew. He didn't even need to ask all the questions in his head.

He did anyway.

\----

Morgana shifted in her seat, smirking at a passing lord that boggled at her in a tunic and trousers. She had been surprised but terribly grateful when Arthur had ordered her not to wear a dress ever again unless she truly wanted to - not even for feasts. Not even for his coronation.

So she wasn't. It was a blast to see the nobles eyes bug out - except, she was surprised to see, for a few who seemed either amused, unsurprised, or even proud. The ladies of the court mostly looked disgusted - but one older one looked supremely _envious_ and a couple of younger unmarried ones (and one married one) looked... speculative. Morgana smiled especially at them, true, warm smiles.

Beside her, Merlin was dressed in a fine blue tunic, but the cloak he had on now was the finest of reds, and the Pendragon symbol was stitched onto it in gold, the dragon shimmering where Merlin had carefully hung the cloak off his chair. It wasn't proper procedure - but Arthur had insisted on showing them off. _All_ of them. Mordred was in blue as well, a couple of shades lighter than Merlin's, and there was a small ring on his hand now, unnoticed by all but a few. Arthur had already signed Mordred as heir to the land that had once been Viviane's dowry and had been added to Morgana's as the last female of that line - she had been only too glad to give it to Mordred.

The ring had been Viviane's, and Morgana wore a matching ring on her own hand that had been her mother's. Both had been found in the small chamber attached to Igraine's as they had cleaned it out. All six of them now lived on that floor, determined to fill it with happiness and their own magic. Beneath his shirt, Arthur wore the last of three rings, having found it on his own private search of his mother's things, left untouched for more than two decades.

Merlin's elbow dug into her ribs - also not protocol, and she was looking forward to watching the court had a _fit_ at their behavior with each other - as Arthur stood up. "Stop teasing the nobility and watch."

"I _am_ nobility," Morgana huffed but leaned forward keenly. After so many pouring speeches, some dancing, and getting to watch Mordred and Lancelot stand up and move around while they had to sit and wait - it had been excruciating. Gwen had been no help as she kept making aborted movements to try and serve something of her own. Merlin at least just _did_ it, not even noticing Arthur's groans of despair.

"My people," Arthur began, the pride in his voice unmistakable. "a great disservice has been done to Camelot for many years bringing about an absence of something that is fundamental in nature and all around us. In fear, we have strived to drive it out and caused only greater harm to the land. Today, I will end this strife."

The court paused, eyes wide, only a few having any idea what was about to happen. All of Arthur's knights, down to a man, shifted their hands to their swords, eyes on the most likely nobles to cause trouble. Morgana had a hand on her sword and another palm up as she mouthed a spell to herself.

"From this day forth, magic is no longer banned in Camelot," Arthur's voice rang out into the stunned room. "It will be treated as any other study, and a person using magic to commit a crime given the same sentence as any other criminal - and the same trial. Magic is welcome in Camelot and in order to facilitate magic's return, I introduce your Court Sorcerer, Lord Merlin of Ealdor."

Morgana nearly choked on the wine she had been sipping to hide her grin. It was the "of Ealdor" that was the surprising part. Ealdor was out of their territory - and one couldn't be a lord of a territory not in their control. She glanced at Merlin, who looked equally stunned. Arthur wasn't done. "As Camelot has seen many troubles caused by magic of late, it only is common sense to have magicians protecting us and a certain brand of protectors willing to help and protect _them_."

Arthur paused a dramatic moment and Morgana suddenly felt suspicious, locking eyes with Gwen on the other side of Arthur. It had been an odd arrangement - her and Merlin on one side, Gwen and Lancelot and Mordred on the other. She had a feeling now that it meant something more. Arthur _smirked_ at them, the smug bastard. "Being one of these protectors will be one of the highest honors. It shows loyalty and skill, whether it be with magic, swords, or both. They shall be the highest magical authority in land except for Lord Merlin and myself and be the first line of defense where magic is used in battle. Some will be from Camelot's own knights - others from the sorcerers I hope will gather in court. But the first of these will be those who have already proved themselves in the face of powerful magic."

He wouldn't. Morgana swallowed, suddenly understanding why Arthur was convinced that her wearing trousers would be a secondary concern when people saw her, why he was sure her authority would not be questioned. The court was frozen as Arthur gestured first to her, and then slowly on. "The Lady Morgana le Fay, Seer, Lady Guinevere the Brave, Sir Lancelot du Lac, and young Squire Mordred, I name you protectors of this land and accord you with the authority of my most prominent advisors. Any one who wishes to join this elite band of our kingdom must first pass the tests they set forth."

Silence reigned as Arthur stopped speaking at right when it was getting to the point where it seemed like it would suffocate them, Arthur sat and magnanimously said, "You may speak."

As if they actually _had_ been waiting for his permission, the hall erupted into noise, protests and cheers alike rising above the crowd. Somewhere in the crowd, she heard a goblet drop to the floor and by the fact it came from Mordred's general direction, she was quite sure it had been him, forgetting in his shock to hold onto it. Her own goblet was precariously tipped forward as she stared at Arthur, who leaned back in his chair and said in a low aside to Merlin, "So, when do you want me to acquire Ealdor?"

"Oh, _gods_," Merlin said, his voice sounding strangled. "You're _insane_. ...And _brilliant_."

She put her goblet down carefully and turned her head to watch Arthur lean forward into Merlin's personal space in full view of the noisy court and purr, "Do you think it would be terrible of me to leave my own coronation early? I have something else in mind for celebrating."

Merlin snorted his laughter into a goblet of hopefully watered down wine (she didn't want to deal with a drunk Merlin who would no longer be scared of punishment for using magic) and answered, "Oh, no. You made this mess. You can deal with it."

Arthur leaned back pouting and Morgana remembered just over a month ago when Merlin had been insisting he and Arthur shouldn't do anything because Arthur needed a queen. Smugly, she knew she had been right. There would be no queen, not for Arthur.

She wasn't too sure about having children herself. Her eyes fell on a stunned Mordred who was being carefully guarded by two knights as he got over his shock. Her lips curled up. It wouldn't be too hard to designate him heir if they needed it to stay in the blood. Mordred was growing up handsome - he would start to fill out in the next few years and Morgana was sure he would rival Arthur for skill in tournaments.

Maybe everything wouldn't be perfect and some things would have to be secret, but she could see the kingdom they would have. It would be green and healthy, and growing. Sometimes through war - but sometimes they would capitulate willing, border barons eager to join a land full of fair justice, peasant revolting and moving, the kingdoms that tolerated magic being allies and eventually lesser kings.

For a moment the room faded and she could see Arthur, High King of Albion. Other Kings would bow to him. All of them, eventually. The druids would rise - but they would be ready, Merlin's protection written in blood. She could see the knights, aging and aged - but not them. Their lives spanned on past what she could see, past what anyone could see as the bond they had made in blood tightened, pulling Arthur, Guinevere, and Lancelot to their own, longer life spans.

Morgana leaned forward, smirking at an outraged courtier. "This wasn't what Nimueh imagined, what we're going to be."

"No," Merlin agreed, the smile he gifted her with still a bit pained at the name, as she thought it might always be. "It's not what any of them imagined. This is our path, not theirs. They can all rot."

At his words, deep below the castle, a dragon cried out in despair. If any above heard him, they were no longer listening.


End file.
